


A Dash of Stardust in the Morning

by dieofthatroar



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Angst, Ghost!Jack, Haunting, How to be a good roommate to a ghost, Hurt/Comfort, Kit the accidental therapy cat, M/M, Magical Artifacts, Magical Pastries, Mutual Pining, Self-Harm, Skate out your emotions, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Witch!Bitty, or alternatively how to get over your dead ex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-08
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2019-03-14 21:21:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 32,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13598640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dieofthatroar/pseuds/dieofthatroar
Summary: “You’re—you’re Eric, right? Eric Bittle?”“Call me Bitty,” he says. His eyes slip from Kent and trail out behind him into the snow-covered yard.“Sure. I’m here because—”“I can see why you’re here,” Bitty says, looking over Kent’s shoulder. Kent turns, knowing what he’ll see, but not believing that Bitty can see it too.There, two feet from the passenger’s seat of the rental car is the flickering image of a boy. He’s made of silver and shadows, like what’s left after the light passes through a stained-glass window—the color drained out, a dullness in his breast. He’s eighteen and will always be eighteen, just like Kent has seen him every single day since the draft more than six years ago. The ghost of Jack Zimmermann.--A magical AU in which Bitty helps Kent convince a ghost to move on because honestly, NHL contract negotiations are hard enough without a spirit watching over your shoulder. Jack, to nobody's surprise, is a very hard ghost to satisfy.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For the lovely mcbangle ~ thank you so much for bidding on me for Fandom Trumps Hate! You were all in for my Bitty/Parse magical AU ideas so thanks for feeding my deep need to write this story. 
> 
> Also thanks to veekay for periodically screaming into my ear as I shaped this plot. It was helpful.

When Eric Bittle was born, his grandmother held him to her breast and whispered into his small, pink ear that he would see universes that nobody else would see. That he would learn to weave sunshine into winter nights and bottle the sound of a lover’s sigh. She told him he would know what the sound of a ringing bell meant when it echoed past midnight and where to look when he needed to regain a little lost time. Little Eric whined and cried and the hospital room shimmered with his tears.

“I know, I know,” his grandmother cooed. “The world’s a big place isn’t it?”

Eric scrunched him his nose. His grandmother kissed his cheek watched as the air around them both warmed with new magic. 

“The world’s a big place, but don’t you forget, you’ll never be alone.”

 

Eric Bittle spent summers in Madison learning which peaches went best canned with which soft words. When he was six, he watched his Grandma Phelps wash the fruit in cold water and pop the pits out with a knife. She gathered his sleepy morning yawns between her fingers and worked them slowly underneath the skins. While the water boiled, she eased the slices into jars before sprinkling in the sugar and stardust.

“What are we missing?” she asked as Eric sat on a stool, peering into the mix.

Eric ran his fingers over the sealed lids of spices and mixes and pulled out a tin labeled _the chill before rain_.

“This,” Eric said, as serious a face as a six-year-old could muster.

“Good choice,” his grandmother said and sprinkled it in.

 

Eric learned quickly to trust his instincts. His mother, not a Seer like him but a Shaper with a touch of Healing, encouraged him when he said that the ice felt good. Felt right. That when he put on skates, the air around him calmed and he could see the lines of magic with more detail than he could on solid ground.

Suzanne packed him hot tea and sewed his competition uniforms. Both kept him warm and safe while Eric danced on the edges of blades.

Though he cried when both his father and his magic pointed him away from figure skating, he knew he didn’t have to give up the ice altogether. Hockey was a different sort of love—one with harsher angles and softer music.

So, he asked his mother to help him weave summer into his jerseys to keep them soft and he put earbuds in before every game to remember the music. Eric trusted the magic his family had passed down to him, though he didn’t always understand it.

 

Eric knew where his grandmother was taking him before they arrived because he could smell the gathering light by the clearing. Still, he let his grandmother lead him through the small grove into the field. They rolled out their blankets and set up the butterfly nets and waited for the starlight to fall.

In this last summer before Eric moved up to Samwell, he’d asked his grandmother to teach him everything she could. He wouldn’t give up the spell work that his family did here in Georgia, but the ice and his magic was pointing him up to the Northeast.

Eric wanted to be a Seer in his own right—to work with spirits and spin craft for his own clients. His grandmother was correct those many years ago, he’d never be alone, but he needed to step away from the south to build himself up. He would stand tall on the bricks he’d made with his own hands.

"You must remember,” his grandmother said, “the stars look like they spread across the land, but it’s only in certain parts of the forest that they make it down to earth.”

Eric could see. It was like there was a path from the sky to the grass. “I know. I’m watching.”

“You must also remember,” she said, “that there are things you will miss. Just because you can see what others can’t doesn’t mean you can see it all.”

As the stars brightened above them, Eric’s grandmother closed her eyes.

“But we made it here, didn’t we?” Eric said. “I can _see_ why we’re supposed to gather stardust here.”

“Water boils slower when you watch it,” his grandmother said. “Stars twinkle as soon as you look away.”

Eric sighed and lay back into the blanket, staring up at the sky. “And Seers are sometimes the ones who are most blind,” he said and sighed. “I know, I know.”

He shut his eyes and listened to the chirping of crickets and the croaking of frogs until, quietly at first then loader and loader, the _plink, plink, plink_ of their nets filling with falling stars.

           

Eric Bittle trusted the light and lines of his magic and the words of his grandmother. That is, of course, until he met Kent Parson.

 

* * *

 

Kent knocks on the door of 27 Concord street on a cold day in mid-January. He has four days between now and his next home game. The rest of his team was already on a plane back to Las Vegas, quiet frustration brewing through the night after their embarrassing loss to Providence. Kent, though, said he had friends he wanted to catch up with this weekend. He talked to his manager and extended his stay and hoped he wasn’t making a terrible mistake.

The house doesn’t look like much at all. It’s a small colonial with a shutter falling loose from the second floor and a rotting wooden railing leading up the front steps. It’s been at least a week since the last snow and the mud is creeping along the edges of the white banks lining the road and everything else looks dusty and dry. Kent always hated this sort of cold up in Montreal. The kind that floated near zero and teased you with false promises of bright sun. It was angry, this type of cold. Jealous. It bit at Kent’s nose and sent a chill up his arms.

He knocked again.

Finally, the door creaks open and there, standing in socks, shorts, and an oversized sweatshirt, is some college kid with wide eyes and a curt frown. He looks at Kent, eyebrows raising a fraction. Did this kid even feel the chill?

“I’m Kent P—”

“I know who you are,” the boy says.

“Right, um. I called earlier?”

The boy stares hard at Kent, like he’s trying to remember something from a long time ago, or trying to fit pieces of a puzzle together. His eyes track from his forehead down his jacket to the ground.

“You’re—you’re Eric, right? Eric Bittle?”

“Call me Bitty,” he says. His eyes slip from Kent and trail out behind him into the snow-covered yard.

“Sure. I’m here because—”

“I can see why you’re here,” Bitty says, looking over Kent’s shoulder. Kent turns, knowing what he’ll see, but not believing that Bitty can see it too.

There, two feet from the passenger’s seat of the rental car is the flickering image of a boy. He’s made of silver and shadows, like what’s left after the light passes through a stained-glass window—the color drained out, a dullness in his breast. He’s eighteen and will always be eighteen, just like Kent has seen him every single day since the draft more than six years ago. The ghost of Jack Zimmermann.

Kent is used to seeing him there, always following him but rarely interfering. Usually, he’s just a mirage at the edge of his vision. It’s the strangest thing to see Bitty staring straight at him.

"Can you help?” Kent asks.

Bitty tears his eyes from Jack’s ghost and opens the door a little wider.

“You’d better come in.”

 

Walking into the house is like wandering into a different world. Warmth envelops Kent as soon as Bitty shuts the door and the scent of burnt sugar and cinnamon fills his nose. Kent leaves his jacket and shoes behind and follows Bitty into the living room. Books litter every free corner with stacks of plants and half-empty jars of what looks like honey or bourbon. Light filters in through hand-stitched curtains and falls on an overstuffed couch where history textbooks and papers lined with red-inked pen are spread out and tumbling to the floor. Kent takes a breath as he looks up at the ceiling—blue and white streaks of paint cover the room wall to wall like the sky is streaking by at a speed he can’t imagine. He blinks.

“Lardo did that,” Bitty says.

“Lardo?”

“My roommate,” he says. “She’s got her studio upstairs, but her work tends to spread out. I don’t mind, I think it fits.”

“Does she have magic, too?”

“Nope,” Bitty says. “Just her brushes and paint. But she helps me out when she can. Makes the work easier. How about you sit down. Coffee? Pie?”

Bitty is gesturing at the couch and Kent carefully displaces some of the schoolwork from the cushions to take a seat. “Sure, uh, coffee sounds good.”

When Bitty disappears to the kitchen, Kent takes closer stock of the baubles lining the shelves and spread across the floor. There’s a clock on the side table that ticks backward, the second hand moving steadily counter-clockwise. The hour hand isn’t quite an hour hand, rather a line pointing to the word _someday._

Bitty returns with a mug in one hand and a plate in the other. “I put a touch of my grandmother’s sugar in there,” he says, putting the coffee on a coaster. “For your nerves. I can see how tense you are.”

“And the pie?” Kent says, accepting a napkin.

“That’s just pie, hun,” Bitty says with a laugh. “No magic. Just the hard work of a well-loved oven.”

Kent doesn’t know what he’s gotten himself into. As Bitty settles into an armchair across from him, hands curled over a mug of his own, he takes a sip. It is calming, in a strange, deep sort of way. He leans back into the pillows.

“I watched your game on TV last night,” Bitty says.

“Did you?”

“Don’t act so surprised,” he says. “I’ve watched enough Aces games to know that wasn’t your best showing.”

“Believe me, I know,” Kent says

“Wiley should be suspended for that cross-check in the second period.”

Kent chuckles. “Is that really what you care about?”

“Your goal in the power play was also decent,” Bitty says.

“It wasn’t enough.”

“Oh, don’t sulk,” Bitty says and gestures at the mug. “Drink some more coffee.”

Kent does as he’s told, taking it in like it’s medicine. “You like hockey?”

“I _play_ hockey,” Bitty says with a growing frown.

“Oh,” Kent says. He downs the rest of his coffee. They’re both quiet for some time, listening to the ticking of the backward clock and the creaking of an old house settling around them. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“Does he always just, stand there?” Bitty asks. He’s looking past Kent’s shoulder again. Jack’s there, of course he is. He always is. Kent has gotten good at ignoring him.

“Not always,” Kent says, thankful to talk about the reason he came. “Sometimes he talks—things I remember him saying to me, or things he must have said to other people. Sometimes he really does talk to me, but it doesn’t happen as much anymore. He usually isn’t too aware of what’s going on around him.”

“Interesting,” Bitty says. “How long?”

“Has he been like this?” Kent says. “He died in 2009. Summertime. He’s always wearing that same fucking T-shirt. I hate it.”

Bitty gets up and walks over to Jack, tiptoeing in his socks like he might scare him. Jack doesn’t react. Doesn’t look at where Bitty is squinting at him, doesn’t move when Bitty puts his hand right through his arm. “There’s not much of him here,” Bitty says.

“What does that mean?” Kent asks.

“I’m not sure yet,” Bitty says. “Can you walk across the room for me?”

Kent gets up and dodges open books and empty bowls to cross the living room. He knows Bitty is watching how Jack follows him. It’s a sort of walking glide. He’d say it was like skating, but Jack never skated with anything but single-minded purpose and that is not at all what this looks like. This is like an afterthought. He’s being tugged along like he’s—

“—tied to you,” Bitty mumbles, fingers to his lips in concentration. “He’s not tied to the living world in general, he’s tied to _you_.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Kent says.

“Shush, don’t be coy,” Bitty says. “I’m surprised because it’s rarer than being tied to a place or a dream.”

“To a dream?”

Bitty waves his arms. “A purpose, or a job that needs to be done,” he says. “This is going to take more work than I anticipated.”

“But it’s possible?”

“Hun,” Bitty says and his eyes light up when he smiles. “I’m the best at what I do.”

 

* * *

 

It doesn’t matter that Bitty knew he’d been coming. No matter how much he thought he’d be prepared for it, he’s surprised when he opens the door to find Kent Parson standing out on his porch, his hair pulled back under his snapback and a dusting of pink over his cheeks. He looks so unsure, twisting his hands together and staring down at Bitty. Immediately, Bitty feels something in his chest lurch.

The magic is even more surprising to Bitty—the hundreds of tiny, quivering strings connecting Kent to the ghost that follows him everywhere. Bitty has never seen anything like it before.

Bitty suggests they go out to dinner because there’s not much more than butter in his fridge and he doesn’t know if he’ll ever have a man as rich as Kent Parson offer to take him out again. He’s a simple sort of guy, he likes to tell himself. He likes good food and he works his hardest to spin the best magic he’s capable of. If those happen to overlap, well, so be it.

They take Kent’s rental into Boston where they squeeze into a cramped little Italian place in the North End.

“My contract is ending after this season,” Kent says as he picks at the bread. He’d ordered wine for the both of them. Something sweeter, he said. Something they’d both enjoy. “I’ll be a free agent and—some GMs are already calling. I never know what to say.”

“You want to leave the Aces?” Bitty asks.

Kent frowns. “Not officially,” he says. “At least not yet.”

“But you’re captain. You’re more valuable to them than you would be if you were traded and your salary—”

“You sound exactly like Jack,” Kent says.

Kent’s eyes are sad and Bitty wonders exactly when Jack had said that. He pours more olive oil onto the center plate and rolls a piece of bread in it. The ghost is in the corner of the restaurant, staring at nothing at all. The waiter walks through him to bring plates out to the customers. “So, you want to leave the Aces, but you’re worried because…?”

“I haven’t done enough for him,” Kent says. “Jack was supposed to go first in the draft, but when it was me, I—I thought that I had to do what he couldn’t. If this life was supposed to be his life, I could complete what he started so he’d be free. But I played and did well and he never left. I won the Calder. I won the cup. I got the C and he’s still here.”

“Could it be something else? Something that isn’t hockey?”

Kent laughs. “It was all hockey to him,” he says. “Our friendship—it was all about that.”

The waiter arrives at their table and serves them their dishes. Piles of pasta and chicken and the heavy smell of garlic.

“He didn’t have magic,” Bitty says.

“No,” Kent says as he digs into his fettuccini. “I don’t either, but I guess you can see that yourself.”

Bitty does. He can’t see the gentle light he sees when he looks at his mother or grandmother. The hands of a Shaper glow. The tongue of a Speaker flashes like glass. Looking at Kent Parson is like the feeling he gets when he steps onto the ice. It’s like his magic is telling him _yes, this is good_ but it isn’t made of magic itself. The many red strings connecting Kent and Jack are the only bits of magic Bitty can see on him.

But once he starts looking, he can’t look away.

He’s attractive, Bitty's not going to lie. He’s exactly the sort of attractive Bitty told himself to stay away from—sharp-muscled jocks with easy smiles and a wink when he walks away from you. But it isn’t just that. It’s like falling into a deep pool of water and feeling completely safe because you know which way is up. He’s a tide, pulling him in. Which is absolutely ridiculous because Kent’s in the NHL, and one of the most recognizable names at that, and he’s absolutely straight and has a ghost magically bound to him. Bitty’s supposed to be a professional about this, and yet, there go Kent’s eyes blinking slowly down at his food.

“How did this happen? If neither of us could shape magic?”

“Some people do this on purpose,” Bitty says. He’s seen it before and it’s never pretty. Something powerful is needed to keep a soul from slipping from this world. Fear or grief can do it, but it’s not the right sort of power. Magic-touched folk who try to bring their loved ones back on purpose are left with shells. The connection between Kent and Jack doesn’t look like that, not completely. “But magic exists even if you can’t control it. Especially when the veil between this world and theirs is thin.”

Kent nods like that all makes sense. Bitty pokes at his meal.

“I have to ask,” Bitty asks, voice soft. “How did Jack die?”

“Does it matter?”

“You know it does if you want me to help you.”

Kent chews on his tongue. Bitty feels a shiver at the back of his neck, like something stirring beyond his vision.

“He took too many pills that night,” Kent says. His eyes are searching—not looking up from his plate, but flicking quickly back and forth. The feeling in Bitty’s neck is growing heavier. More present. “I wasn’t able to get there in time. I thought I could—I didn’t—”

Kent bites the inside of his cheek and downs the rest of his wine. Bitty can feel the sharp tug of magic around him and he shifts in his seat. He turns and a shudder passes down his spine.

There, Jack is staring straight at the two of them. Color bleeds into his features like they hadn’t before—blue in his shirt and pink in his cheeks—and when the waiter comes around again, he steps to the side to avoid him. The ghost of Jack opens his mouth like he wants to say something, taking one step, then two, to close the distance between him and where Bitty and Kent are sitting.

But then, Kent says, “It was a long time ago. He was already gone and there was nothing I could have done differently to save him.”

Jack shimmers and fades. The ghost looks away like he’s forgotten why he’s here. The tension in the strings connecting Kent and Jack slacken and Bitty feels a knot in his throat.

“I’m sorry,” Bitty says and takes another bite of his pasta so he won’t have to look at Kent when he says so.

 

Bitty worries that the car ride home would be a somber, quiet thing, but as soon as they pull out of the garage Kent turns P!nk up loud and sings along. When Bitty wrestles the phone from Kent’s hand and changes the music, he’s delighted to find out that Kent knows the words to every Destiny’s Child song he puts on.

Bitty fights against the urge to bottle Kent’s laughter to use for later. He forces himself to simply listen, in awe of how powerful it could be if infused into a charm.

“Dude, my teammates usually give me shit for this stuff,” Kent says.

“No shame,” Bitty says. “Lord, I once had to give a powerpoint presentation to my teammates on the basics of Beyoncé.”

“Just once?” Kent says.

“I intend to give a refresher each year for the frogs.”

“As you should,” Kent says. “I can’t believe you’re in school and do this work too.”

Bitty watches the street lights pass by, steady lines of light and dark. “My school work isn’t exactly… spectacular,” he says. “But I’m just going to keep doing this magic consult stuff after I graduate, so my grades don’t matter too much.”

“It’s still fucking impressive, Bitty.”

The car is too dark for Kent to see Bitty smile.

 

* * *

 

The Aces have a home game against the Islanders when Kent gets back to Vegas. They win in overtime.

The next day, Kent skypes Bitty.

“Goodness, I’ve never seen such a lucky shot,” Bitty says as his image pops up on Kent’s screen.

“It wasn’t luck!” Kent says. “It was skill! I’m a professional!”

“Hun, that puck bounce was anything but skill.”

Kent pouts. “Luck’s part of the game too.”

“Don’t I know it,” Bitty says.

Kent is in his living room, enjoying the few days he gets to spread out on his own couch before he has to pack his bags for another week on the road.

“Can you try something for me?” Bitty asks. From what Kent can see, he’s in his kitchen. There are pots and pans hanging from hooks along the wall and the edge of a sink in the background.

“What?”

“Try pointing your camera at where Jack is right now,” Bitty says.

Kent looks up. Jack is near the door to his bedroom, as silent and still as he usually is. Kent rotates his laptop and squints at the screen to see if he’s directing it correctly. He sees the edge of the open door, the frame of a painting, but no Jack. Kent looks up and Jack’s still there. He says so.

“That’s what I thought,” Bitty says. “Makes sense why I can’t see him during your games either.”

“Is this usually how it works?” Kent asks. “Can you see any magic through cameras or—”

“Only if it’s made by a Shaper,” Bitty says. “Still, I wanted to make sure. It means that Jack really exists.”

Kent frowns. “As opposed to…?”

“Some magic is more about illusions,” Bitty explains. “Something may have happened to make you _think_ that you see Jack. I’d only see him because I’m attuned to what you see. But if you can see him but I can’t through the camera, it’s not just the illusion.”

“What? Like I might have gotten too many hits to the head?”

“Not like that.”

Jack’s hair—brown in life, but now just a dull gray—falls over his eyes. He stares at nothing, not caring that his hair is in the way. How many times in the past six years has Kent thought about running his fingers through that hair like he used to? Just to get it out of the way. _Now you can see, man._

Kent knows Jack’s real, but Bitty telling him that doesn’t make him feel any better.

“I wish it was just me,” he says. “That it was just one puck too fast to the ear and—”

“Kent—”

“He’s stuck here,” Kent says. “But he can’t do anything. It’s terrible. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone, but especially him—I don’t—”

“If it makes you feel better, it isn’t completely him,” Bitty says. “Or, I should say, it isn’t the complete version of him. Ghosts like this? Parts of them are stuck in the living world while the rest of them moves on. They can have thoughts and memories, but are closer to an echo.”

“An echo?”

“Don’t get me wrong. They still have no desire to stay here, the living world isn’t for them. But they feed off the emotions that kept them stuck here. If we find out what those emotions were, we might be able to satisfy him. We can free him.”

“I don’t understand,” Kent says. “Is this Jack or not?”

“It’s a part of him,” Bitty says. “A splinter of his soul. The Jack you remember before he died? The ghost isn’t him. But he came _from_ that Jack.”

Kent’s fingers twitch, the desire to tangle his fingers into Jack’s dumb fucking hair strong again. Jack flickers, glows, turns towards him.

 _Kenny,_ Jack says, barely a whisper. Kent would know how to read his names on his lips anyway. _Kenny, I need you to help me._  

Bitty’s still talking. “—we just need to figure out what part of Jack it is. If it’s hockey, it must be a different sort of success—”

Jack is walking towards Kent, those sad eyes turning from white to ice to sky blue. _Kenny, you know it isn’t just that._

Kent shuts his eyes and takes a breath, overfilling his lungs and tuning them both out—the ease of Bitty’s voice across digital distances and the pleas of Jack’s across death. There are so many things he could do. That he can be. What can he _do_ to show that will satisfy him? What can he do to make Jack look at him like he did when Kent used to push his bangs out of his eyes—wide-eyed and in awe like he had never expected anyone to care.

“Kent?” Bitty says. “Kent, hun, you alright?”

Kent opened his eyes. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, sorry, long night last night.”

Bitty nods. The connection goes bad and his head freezes in movement, a blur of blonde hair and fair skin. His voice comes through though Kent can’t see him speak.

“Don’t worry. We’ll figure out how to help him move on.”

Jack’s ghost grows thin again and out of the corner of his eye, Kent can see that he’s returned to his corner next to the door.

 

When Kent was 15 and terrified, he’d walked up the steps to a house he’d never seen before but now was told he had to call home. He had brought nothing but a few changes of clothes and his skates. No photos of his mom or sister (“if this is your decision, Kent, do it for real. Don’t come back because you think you miss this hellhole”) no cell phone (it was a different country, anyway) no pads or gloves or even a stick (he hoped Bob Zimmermann would take pity on him or else he’d be skating naked in their first practice).

Jack let him inside that first day and took him up to the guest room that would be his for three years. When he explained in that French-Canadian accent of his, that over the years Kent would hear dip lower, which bathroom to use and where the laundry was, Kent found it hard to listen. All he could think was, _please, let this be a friend. Please, let him not care. Please, let him smile back._

The Jack on ice, Kent learned quickly, wasn’t a friend. At least not at first. He cared only for himself and he never smiled.

Jack at home, though. Jack at home joked with Kent. He listened to Kent’s hopes and gave him a shy grin when he said _me too_.

But the balance chipped away slowly after that. Each year closer to the draft, ice-Jack came home and ice-Jack never cared about Kent. He learned to live with a ghost far before any magic was ever involved.

When Kent was 23, he found Kit by the side of the road. She was dusty and a little bit mean, but after a reluctant bath and assortment of different brands of cat food, she’d warmed up to Kent’s home. To him. Kent had never thought of himself as a cat person before then, but as soon as he saw Kit lounging on the coffee table, he knew he’d never let her go. He was sick of being the sole roommate to a ghost and Kit made his house feel a little more like a home.

 

Kent packs a jar of Bitty’s sleep-strength tea in his bag when he leaves for his roadie. After he dropped him off that first day they met, Bitty rushed inside to gather a few bottles, jars, and a whole pie for him to bring home. “The pie is for now,” Bitty said. “The rest is for later, when you really need it.”

Each came with instructions in tight handwriting scrawled on labels tied on. The one he pulls out when he arrives in the Calgary hotel room said _for when the night lasts too long and sleep hides like a frightened child, mix one spoonful of tea with a mug of hot milk._

Kent opens the jar and the smell hits him hard and solid in the chest. It smells like home. Not a home he’s ever lived in, no. Not like oil grease and microwave dinners, or not like scented candles and Bob Zimmermann’s cooking. This tea smells like sharing a couch with a movie playing in the background or jokes over a home-cooked breakfast. It smells like late mornings and soft bed covers.

Strangely, Kent feels the sudden urge to cry.

Instead, he does as the instructions said, asking room service to bring him up hot milk and adding Bitty’s mix inside.

Kent sleeps with the company of pleasant dreams that night.

He scores two goals in the game the next day.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Aces play the Bruins, Lardo gives Kent some advice, and Bitty notices something strange about Jack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listening to "You'll Never Walk Alone" writing this because ~mood~ with the slow realization that this is almost a Carousel AU. Give me your dead lovers yelling into the void, trying to fix their mistakes.

Growing up, much of Bitty’s worth was placed on his abilities. Many of those abilities were not too valued by his family. When he stayed inside to bake with his grandma, his uncles would tease him and ask why he wasn’t out throwing the football with his cousins. When he learned to play football, they told him he wasn’t cut out for the sport. When he found a sport that suited him better, the same members of his family told him it was worse than baking because at least, with food, they’d have a product at the end they could enjoy. Could devour.

Bitty baked anger into his cakes and brought them to Christmas and only his grandmother frowned when she bit in.

What _was_ always valued in him was his magic. It was innate and easy from his fingers, unlike much of the Phelps family and nearly all of the Bittle’s. That’s what he became. _“Oh, this is Dicky, Suzanne’s kid. Yeah, he’s a bit small, but we’re told he has a gift.” “He’s an odd one, but at least there’s magic in him.” “Something a bit off, but you should ask him for one of his tonics.”_

Over the years, Bitty learned to believe it. He understood that _at least_ he was useful to others in this one thing, so he should be grateful. He was the cousin that could make paper planes dance in the air, or give you that potion for your sore throat, or look up a recipe to get over your breakup. He earned their love. He worked hard for it.

But the whole while, he wished he didn’t have to.

 

* * *

 

“I miss you,” Kent says to the dead eyes of Jack Zimmermann. Kent reaches up, trying to touch his cheek, but his fingers go straight through. “You’re here and I still miss you.”

Jack’s image wavers. He turns to look Kent in the eye and his voice sounds like it comes from a million miles away. “You always say that.”

Kent’s fingers go straight through and he just wants to feel something real. Anything real. His fingers find his arm and rake. He does it again and again until he sees blood under his nails.

Jack fades and Kent picks up his phone to call Jeff because he doesn’t think he should be alone tonight.

 

“The hell is up with your contract talks?” Jeff says. He’s on the couch in Kent’s hotel room, flipping through the channels to find American Ninja Warrior reruns. “Everyone’s been so shady about it that the media’s starting to notice.”

Kent doesn’t know what to say. “I just can’t see myself here next year.”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s not the team. I just feel like I don’t see eye to eye with the organization—”

“Oh, don’t give me that on-camera crap,” Jeff says.

“What do you want me to say?” Kent says. “Jim’s been on my case for weeks but they never actually _listen_ to me. The more money they offer, the more it feels like I’m their trained monkey.”

“Comes with the territory.”

“No,” Kent says. “They act like they own me because they _made_ me or some shit like that. They have their heads so far up their asses that they assume I’ll resign and I’m just stroking my own ego.”

Jeff laughs. “Not entirely unfair.”

Kent punches Jeff in the shoulder.

 

* * *

 

Skyping becomes a habit of Bitty and Kent’s, usually under the guise of research, but they go longer and into later hours than either of them intend. Bitty doesn’t want to admit how much he enjoys it.

“Mr. Parson, say that again and I’ll—”

“What?” Kent says, innocent. “I just meant that if your neighbors really can’t tell the difference, swapping a few ingredients won’t make a huge difference.”

“But then it’s just a big ol’ meringue! I can’t walk into their house and call that a Dacquise with the _knowledge_ that I _substituted_ ingredients.”

“Those are a lot of big words,” Kent says.

“Well, sir, I’m not sacrificing my integrity as a baker just because some people are _ignorant._ ”

“Hey!”

“Oh, not you,” Bitty says. “Well, yes, you too. But I have hope that you’re not a lost cause.”

“I’ll have you know, I’m a very quick study,” Kent says. “And I make a fucking amazing breakfast burrito.”

“We’ll see about that, hun,” Bitty says.

 

Bitty thinks about Jack. About teenage boys and the pressure of legacy and the desire to succeed. About every single person who had told Bob Zimmermann’s son that he was destined for greatness and that the whole world was watching him. That he better not let them down. That he was worth nothing except for what he was worth to _them._

_“Oh, that’s Bob Zimmermann’s boy. A strange kid, but you should see him on the ice.”_

Bitty had taken one way to escape those sorts of voices. Jack had taken another. He wonders what would have happened if there were two different roads open to them and they had met in another way. If their paths would have ever crossed.

 

A couple nights later, Bitty and Kent talk again. The background behind Kent changes as he moves from hotel to hotel on a long trip from Calgary to Winnipeg to Pittsburg, but the smile in greeting stays the same.

“What have you been working on?” Kent says.

 “There are a few spells that have worked for spirits stuck in our world,” Bitty says. He has the computer propped up on the kitchen table, away from the mess of flour and fruit spread across the counter.

“A few?”

“We need to be careful. Each spirit is different, has different needs. What we put into the ritual changes based on how we can loosen his hold on the living.”

“You need to know about Jack,” Kent says.

“Anything you can tell me.”

Kent goes quiet. He opens his mouth to speak a couple times but shuts it again, as if he’s afraid of what will come out.

“He is— _was_ —so focused. So single-mindedly determined it was always hard for him to look beyond the puck. Even when we weren’t at practice it was practically all we talked about. But he was kind, when he remembered other people existed. He once—” Kent paused like he was trying to remember a word on the tip of his tongue. “It’s hard, talking about him. I don’t—I haven’t said anything about him for years.”

“I assume your team doesn’t know,” Bitty says.

“Of course not,” Kent says. “It’s one thing for Scraps to bring in an enchanted Christmas tree to the rink for fun. It’s another thing for me to say I’ve been haunted by the ghost of my friend for my whole career.”

“That’s a lonely thing,” Bitty says. “Keeping him a secret.”

Kent sighs. Bitty wipes his hands and turns his attention back to the computer. He can see Kent rubbing his neck, eyes fixed off-screen.

Kent brings a passion to everything he does. The way he talks about his team and his work on the ice. He has a way of leaning into his words, watching Bitty’s face to see how he reacts. He waits for Bitty’s responses. He listens with a shine in his eye that makes Bitty trip over whatever thought he was going to say.

But sometimes, he drifts away from where Bitty can catch him. He looks lost and small and afraid to speak. Bitty wishes he could put his hand right through the screen and shake him awake.

“What do you think,” Bitty says. Kent’s eyes flick back up. “I’ve got fresh strawberries and blackberries from the market today, which sounds better in this cake?”

“Um,” Kent says. “Blackberries?”

Bitty takes the package out of the fridge and hums to himself. “This is usually a summer cake,” he says. “The colors just make it feel so warm. Sometimes we can’t use spells for everything, huh? Gotta make yourself remember summer the old-fashioned way.”

Bitty mixes the sponge cake and sets the oven. He’s aware of Kent watching every move.

“When do I get to taste these?” Kent asks.

Bitty pours the mix into the tray. “When do I get to see you play in person?”

“We play the Bruins in the beginning of February,” Kent says.

“A game for some baked goods, then?”

“Deal.”

“Okay then,” Bitty says. “Now, because your opinion is very important, I’m going to need your help for the rest of this as well. In the meantime, tell me more about Jack.”

 

Kent is true to his word. On the last weekend in February, Bitty heads up to Boston to watch the Aces at the TD Garden.

Bitty clutches his ticket to his chest, telling himself again he’s being silly. That this crush might get in the way of his work. That it was reckless to mix infatuation and magic.

That it is useless to fall in love with a straight boy.

But when Bitty sees Kent skate to center ice, none of that matters. There’s no better drug—no better elixir to wipe all common sense from his head—than the sight of Kent Parson so fully in his element.

Kent is beautiful on the ice. He’s all will and steel and as he cuts across the ice and pulls off plays Bitty only dreams of in his college games. He’s the kind of skater Bitty would want to be if he could compete at that level. All agility and speed. On a breakaway, Kent spins out of Chara’s reach and passes to Jeff Troy. Bitty grips the lip of his seat, foot bouncing. Troy gets hit and the loose puck flies out in front of the net. Kent gets to it first.

“Come on,” Bitty says, under his breath.

Kent shoots with both Bruins defensemen closing in. It ricochets off the post. Bitty lets his breath out through his nose.

The first period goes by with neither team scoring.

Midway through the second period, Bitty thinks he notices something out of the corner of his eye, but the crowd starts going crazy as the Bruins get close to the net and there’s a scramble on the ice. Kent steals the puck and races halfway down the ice before his pass is intercepted. The mass of people decked out in black and yellow starts screaming again and—

There. Bitty notices it again. He frowns, counts the players on the ice. It’s one too many.

 _Jack._ It’s Jack out there on the ice next to Kent. He’s in hockey gear, but not quite the Aces colors. What Bitty saw as black is actually a dark blue, growing lighter and darker as Kent shoves his way past bodies with his eyes on Rask.

It’s hard to keep focused on the ghost. It takes all of Bitty’s concentration to follow him up and down the ice, never too far from Kent’s side.

Kent gets an assist late in the second period, but it’s quickly followed up by one from the Bruins so the score is 1-1 going into the third period.

What Bitty doesn’t understand is how corporal Jack looks. Even as Kent sits on the bench, the ghost is there in full gear, tapping his gloves on his stick and watching the game like another member of the team. The other Aces look right through him—talk to Kent through the invisible space that is actually Jack’s forehead—but it’s clear that Kent can see him. He isn’t bothered. When Jack’s mouth moves like he’s talking, Kent tilts his head to listen.

The third period starts with too much time spent around the Aces net. They’re playing a defensive game and it only gets worse when Troy gets called for tripping and the Bruins get a power play.

Kent throws himself into his game. He goes down hard from cross-check behind the net but manages to get the puck to one of his defensemen. Jack’s uniform grows a brighter blue against the white ice. Kent takes another hit into the boards and Jack is right there with him.

That’s when Kent finds his chance. He takes the puck in a cross-ice pass and rushes to the Bruins net. He turns, aims at the net, and shoots.

It isn’t going to go in. Rask is already down on his knees, but the puck is off to the side. It’ll miss wide.

But it doesn’t.

Jack’s there by the net like he knows where the puck will be. Like he’s done this before. He taps it into the bottom corner and the light flashes red.

There’s noise all around him. Shouts of anger, swears, some cheering. Bitty doesn’t take his eyes off Jack, standing back as Kent’s enveloped by the long arms of Troy.

It’s dangerous to mix love and magic when you don’t know the consequences. As Kent skates to his bench to celebrate the point with his team, Jack is as solid as ever. Bitty sees Kent’s face when he looks back at Jack and knows for certain that is what it is. Love.

 

The Aces manage to keep their lead and win 2-1. Bitty meets Kent outside after he changes and does his press.

“Bitty!” Kent says and hugs him. He has his snapback on and a clean sweatshirt, though he carries the smell of the locker room with him. He looks so genuinely happy to see him that Bitty’s heart swells. The trailing high of the win adding to the smirk Kent throws him as they part.

“Hey,” Bitty says. It would be so easy to greet Kent like he hadn’t seen anything during the game. Like he hasn’t spent all of the last period trying to understand what he was seeing and instead bask in the light of Kent’s attention.

Kent puts his arm around Bitty’s shoulders and turns him to the exit. “What do you say to Chinese? One of the guys told me about a great place in Allston we can head to.”

It would be easy to say nothing, but he has a responsibility as a Seer. As a friend. Bitty catches sight of Jack, back to his T-shirt and jeans, barely visible in the waves of moving crowds.

“I think you haven’t been completely honest with me,” Bitty says.

Kent’s smile wavers. “What do you mean?”

“I saw you out there with Jack.”

“He—yeah, uh—he’s always more active during games. I thought I told you that.”

“Hun, please,” Bitty says.

Kent leans in, his face now press-ready mask again. “This isn’t something we can talk about out here, is it?” he says. Crowds walk past, some staring and pointing at Kent. Some flipping him off, others just gaping. Bitty wonders if this is how it always is.

“Kent, what—”

“I also know some good places to get takeout,” Kent says. Bitty can read nothing in his face, or his tone of voice. He can’t tell what he’s thinking at all. “Or, if you want to really teach me how to bake one of those cakes, maybe it’s best we go back to your place. This might be a long conversation.”

 

* * *

 

Kent ends up back on Bitty’s couch, looking up at the abstract sky painted across the ceiling, wondering how he got here.

The books and potions and knickknacks on the shelves have more meaning to him now. He can trace Bitty’s stories of his summers with his grandmother through bottles labeled with loopy black lettering. He can pick out photos of friends and his team. A cookbook lays open on the table to a black forest cake.

“It’s not just the hockey he’s connected to,” Bitty says. “Jack. He’s tied to your emotions. To _you._ ”

“I know it’s me,” Kent says.

“Not your playing, Kent. Not just because you were the closest person around or because he shared his wishes with you. It’s _you_ he cares about.”

Kent laughs. He doesn’t believe that. “No.”

“Who was he to you?”

“A friend. A teammate. Someone who just happened to be there.”

“Please,” Bitty says. “Just be honest with me.”

Kent remembers late nights in Montreal, both he and Jack too tired from practice to do much more than watch TV. He remembers the looks they shared, the easy teasing and the blushes. He also remembers that it was always him—always Kent—who reached for his hand. Who rested his head on Jack’s shoulder or stole a kiss when they were both so sleepy they couldn’t think of what would happen after.

 “He never felt the same way as I did,” Kent says. “Sure, we fooled around like teenagers. It was physical. He never said—he didn’t think it was something serious.”

Bitty has that look on his face again like the whole world is a puzzle that he can solve. “But what about you?”

Kent remembers Jack pushing him away, almost embarrassed, and the feeling of loss he could never get over.

“I never got enough of what I wanted,” Kent says.

Bitty’s hand finds Kent’s arm and it’s warm and firm. He pulls himself onto the couch and Kent makes space beside him. Bitty tucks his feet up and leans into Kent’s chest.

“Is this alright?” Bitty says.

Kent nods and knows Bitty can feel it.

“I’m sorry you can’t tell anyone,” Bitty says. “I’m just—I’m sorry.”

“I wasn’t enough for him,” Kent says. He has to unstick the words from his chest where he’s kept them, unspoken, for years. "If I could have been he wouldn’t have—”

Bitty’s grip on his arm steadies him. “You can’t put that on yourself.”

“I can,” Kent says. “I’m still not enough for him because he’s _still here.”_

Bitty leans back and Kent wishes he wouldn’t take away the warmth of his body. “We’ll make it better,” he says. “But you need to be honest with me from now on for this to work.”

Kent is going to agree, but suddenly there’s the sound of a key in a lock and the front door sliding open.

“Bits, you home?”

Bitty jumps off the couch. “Living room, Lardo.”

A small college girl turns the corner, shrugging off a coat that she throws onto the armchair. “Holy shit,” she says when she spots Kent. “You weren’t kidding about the game.”

“Lardo, I told you—”

“Okay, but when you say _I’m helping an NHL player with a magical issue_ I didn’t actually think—anyway. Hi! I’m Larissa, but everyone calls me Lardo.”

She holds out her hand and Kent is shaking it. It’s a stronger grip than he expected. “You did the painting,” he says. He gestures vaguely around the room because it isn’t just the ceiling. There are canvases scattered around, both used and not, and some other half-finished projects he can’t begin to try to describe.

“I did,” she says. “You got a hat trick last time you played Dallas.”

“I did,” Kent says.

“Nice.” Lardo then turns to Bitty. “I’ll be upstairs. I have a project due in a couple days so sleep might not be an option.”

“You want a tonic?” Bitty says.

“I’ll just chug some coffee,” Lardo says, then frowns. “Unless I get desperate.”

“I’ll leave a bottle in your room.”

“Thanks, Bits,” she says. “Parse, you should come up to my studio. Distractions would be great for my motivation.”

Lardo waves and she’s gone.

“That was—hmm,” Kent says. “I don’t think that made sense?”

Bitty laughs. “Come on, we’ve got some sleepless tonic to cook up.”

 

Watching Bitty brew with magic is almost like watching him bake. He commands the chaos of the kitchen with precision Kent doesn’t know is possible and when Bitty asks for something like _essence of hourglass_ Kent is stuck wandering the pantry, confused.

“Oh Lord, it’s the first one on the right of… you know what? Never mind.”

Kent is quickly put on stirring duty.

“Your watch,” Bitty says, tapping Kent’s silver wristwatch as they brew. “It’s magical. Did you know that?”

“Oh,” Kent says. “Yeah, I guess I figured. My aunt has a touch of Luck, barely anything at all really. Only person with magic in the family. She gave this to me a few years ago as a birthday gift.”

“Can I see it?”

Kent takes it off and passes it to Bitty. It glints in the iridescent lights of the kitchen, throwing reflections around the room when he turns it over.

“It keeps… personal time?” Bitty guesses. “Important meetings, game times?”

“Pretty much,” Kent says. “I’ll always seem to wake up on time without an alarm when I’m wearing it, or realize I’m running late with enough time to hurry.”

“Just a touch of Luck,” Bitty says. He hands it back and Kent puts it back on. “It’s good magic.”

Bitty pours the last of the ingredients into the pot and hands Kent a lid. They leave the tonic to boil and the smell of morning dew and fresh pancakes fills the room.

 

Bitty lets Kent stay in the guest room on the second floor. He explains that someone named Chowder sleeps there once in a while—thus the terrible arrangement of Sharks paraphernalia strewn across the bed—and someone named Shitty says he sleeps there when he’s really sleeping with Lardo.

After he gets settled, Kent takes the tonic up to Lardo as an excuse to check out her work.

Her studio covers the entirety of a converted attic. Tarps line the floor and easels run along one wall. Lardo is standing in front of one, one hand on her hip, the other hanging on loosely to a brush dripping crimson red onto the floor. There are streaks of the color on her overalls and the skin of her forearms. She looks a little like Lady Macbeth, wiping death from her hands. Just a little terrifying.

“Oh, Parse,” she says when she notices him at the door. “You can put that down over there, thanks.”

She points to a small table off by the window, now only occupied by a single flower in a vase and a metal water bottle.

“So how goes the magic-ing?” she asks.

“Uh,” Kent says. “Slowly? But I think we’re making progress.”

“He doesn’t like to sing his own praises too often,” Lardo says. Frowns. “Well, maybe he does. But he’s not very good at it. Let me tell you this, though, you won’t find someone who is more dedicated to your cause.”

“I believe it,” Kent says.

Lardo cocks her head, appraising Kent like he’s her next empty canvas.

“Bits tends to keep quiet about his clients,” Lardo says as she dips the brush into water and dries it on a towel. “But this is another level. How _did_ someone like you find him? It’s not as if he advertises widely.”

“I played with another Seer in a few camps back when I was a kid,” Kent says. “I saw him again recently and he noticed my—ah—magical problem. Gave me Bitty’s number.”

“And who was that?”

“Someone named Johnson?”

Lardo laughs. “Of course.” She puts her brushes down and walks to the corner of the room with the window and the table and opens the tonic. She takes one whiff of it, makes a face, and swallows it like a shot. “God, that’s not the best tasting one of his.”

“Wow.”

“Oh, don’t be impressed by that,” she says. “Come here. Let me show you something.”

Kent hesitates as Lardo moves a couple canvasses out of the way. From the back, she pulls out a long canvas, maybe two feet tall by six feet wide. Like the ceiling downstairs, it’s abstract, but in a way that makes Kent feel like he’s known it forever. It’s white and blue and gray with streaks running across. It feels like snowfall out on the center of a frozen pond.

After he looks at it for a few seconds, it starts to change. Morph and shift like the snow is really falling, and he’s skating along the ice to a tree line… but then, the image shifts again and he’s lost in the snow.

“Did that just move?”

“Bitty is sometimes the worst person in the world to collaborate with,” Lardo says. “But I promised I’d help him after he said his grandmother’s too sick to make the trip up north to see the snow and he’d really like something for her to keep around. Ice, you know, to make her think of him.”

Kent takes another step toward the painting. “That’s amazing.”

“Took a good three months to get around to making the paint,” Lardo says. “I honestly don’t know how he finishes half his schoolwork on time. You better get used to whatever problem you’ve got because Bitty might take a while with it. He’ll get it done, and it’ll be the best job anyone will do, but it will take a while.”

Kent doesn’t want to say that’s alright with him. That he’s gotten used to Bitty’s calls and his smiles and he wants more reason to visit this place. But he can’t say that. He can hardly name what it is this feeling is, though he wants it to last.

“It’s okay,” Kent says. “I’ve had this problem a while, a little more time can’t hurt.”

Lardo purses her lips. “I’ll give you my number because sooner or later Bitty will try to avoid his responsibilities by drowning in his own jam and this way I won’t have NHL lawyers knocking at my door.”

“I would never—”

“Sure, sure,” Lardo says. “Now get out. I’ve got a thesis to finish.”

 

Kent has to get up early the next morning to catch the flight out with his team. The sun is out, even if it’s still a bleak February morning with temperatures below zero, so says his phone. He likes it here like it’s some sort of vacation. He’s so sick of hotel room after hotel room that all look the same. He could be in Arizona or Montreal and he wouldn’t know the difference. But here? Here it feels like New England. The wood floors are cold before he puts his socks on and he can see bare trees from the window.

He takes a shower, puts on his suit, and thinks about writing a thank-you note to Bitty before he heads out, but when he gets to the bottom of the stairs, he hears the crackle of bacon and smells freshly brewed coffee.

“Bitty that looks fucking fantastic,” he says as he drops his bags off in the front hall.

“Who says you get any?” Bitty says.

Kent sniffs the pan from over Bitty’s shoulder. “Lardo says you usually get up at noon on the weekend,” he says. “I doubt you’re getting ready to go to the library, so why else would you be up so early except to make me breakfast?”

“Now don’t think so highly of yourself, sir,” Bitty says. “It’s only a proper host’s duty.”

“Well then, you’re a proper host,” Kent says. He plucks a fork from a drawer and stabs a piece of bacon that looks perfectly well done.

“Kent! You’ll burn yourself!”

Kent scoots out of Bitty’s reach, blowing on his breakfast prize. Bitty turns the burner off and goes after him. Tongue out, Kent dances around the kitchen table, before smirking and taking a bite.

“Ow,” Kent says. “Ow.”

“Told you.”

Kent takes one look at Bitty’s big, brown eyes before shoving the rest in his mouth. “Worth it,” he says between chews.

“Won’t taste much of anything if you scorch your taste buds off,” Bitty says. He goes back to the stove and starts pulling the rest of the bacon onto a rack to cool. He doesn’t turn to Kent as he pours a cup of coffee and reaches for plates from the cupboard.

“You’re pouting,” Kent says. “Holy shit, you’re actually pouting.”

“I’m not.”

“You are.” Kent pulls up a chair from the table and takes a seat, making a show of looking a polite guest. “Taste buds or no, I’m going to enjoy this.”

Bitty puts the plate in front of Kent with a little more force than is strictly necessary and Kent complements the food with as much detail as he can. The smoky taste, the hint of maple. The depth of flavor of the jam that has, what is it? Two? Three different berries?

After he says goodbye and the door is shutting behind him, Kent thinks he can hear Bitty whisper under his breath, “this boy…”

Kent catches sight of Jack, standing under the lonely tree in the front yard, looking at him like he knows too much.

“You have something to say?” Kent says to him.

Jack only shakes his head. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magic is metaphor, except when it's not. Alicia Zimmermann wants to see her son. Bitty and Kent go for a drive in Montreal.

Love is a fickle sort of magic. Mix the same ingredients, the same people, the same place, and you'll never get the same result. Words and actions can have two completely different outcomes and one love can change over time.

What happens when two teenagers fall in love? When one wants the world and dies grasping for it, and the other wants a person and has to live with his memory?

Bitty has to turn that information over in his mind again and again after the Aces game. Kent looking back at a Jack who had life in him on the ice. Kent willing to do anything to set his friend free. Kent, in love with a _boy._

Bitty tries very hard not to think about what that could mean for him.

 

“Did you have something you wanted to talk about?” Bitty says into his computer. It’s 11 pm after a game and Kent looks exhausted.

“No,” Kent says. “I just wanted to talk, is that ok?”

“Yeah,” Bitty says. “Course it is, hun.”

Bitty waits, but Kent doesn’t say anything else. He just stares and stares past the camera, shadows under his eyes.

“You have any more Kit pictures to send?” Bitty tries. “Lardo sent the last one to the whole team.”

Kent almost smiles and pulls out his phone. “Yeah, one sec. I’ve got a video of her with the new toy I just bought.”

They spend the next half an hour discussing the finer details of cat treats. 

 

* * *

 

Desire isn’t something that Kent ever learned how to express. He speaks with his actions and wishes he could convey everything he wants to say with a look or a touch. In his mind, he’s so obvious. The raking fingers and pleading tongues are like shouting his intentions to the heavens.

Jack hadn’t heard him clearly enough.

So now, Kent has to wonder why he keeps wanting to reach through the computer screen and touch Bitty’s cheek. Why it hurts when he twists his fingers into knots to keep himself from trying.

 

“You can’t just say that and—”

“And what, Kenny?” Jack says. “You can’t ignore the truth.”

“It’s not—that’s only what you think, Zimms. I’m not the only one they’re talking about.”

“Everyone knows you haven’t re-signed yet,” Jack says. “What’s your worth to the Aces? To anyone? If they trade you now because they know—”

“It won’t matter.”

“—the Aces won’t be in a position to get to the playoffs and the trade deadline—”

“I don’t care.”

Jack makes a face and Kent wants to sink into the floor. “That isn’t true.”

“How could you know?” Kent says. “What would you know about _my_ life when you’re—when you’re—”

“Dead?” Jack says.

Kent wishes he could slam the door and trap Jack with a wall between them. Wishes he could plug his ears and shut his eyes and pretend Jack didn’t exist. That he was alone. That Jack was really—no.

No, he _was_ dead. But it’s the wishing that makes Kent fall apart. Wishing for what couldn’t be and wishing for… for what? For it to end?

Kent sinks onto his couch and wishes for things he can have. He presses his fingers against a bruise from the last game, a terribly blue stain across his hip from a check into the boards. He digs his fingers in until can only feel the white-hot splinter shock of the hit.

He knows there are other ways to do this, but if he avoids the blades and carved lines, maybe he can pretend it isn’t the same thing. As long as he can explain away every scar, nobody will look at him like he’s heading down the same path as Jack once did.

A soft meow and the bat of a paw against his thigh finally makes Kent stop. Kit, wrapping her soft body around his ankle, shows her teeth when she mews at him, again and again until Kent releases his leg to reach to her.

“Hey, girl,” Kent whispers into her fur.

Kit blinks once, slowly, and starts to purr.

 

“We need to go to Montreal,” Bitty says the next Friday. Kent knew this was coming. “I have to see where Jack died.”

“Bitty, I don’t think—” Kent sighs. “Jack’s parents—I haven’t spoken to them in a long time.”

“There’s magic in place, Kent,” Bitty says. He looks so sincere, so determined. It’s as if he planned this conversation beforehand and was just speaking through his points. Kent knows what that’s like, being in front of a camera and trying to find exactly what he’s meant to say. “And if that’s also the place where you and Jack grew up together, we need to go there.”

“Bitty—”

“History leaves marks on objects, you know. There could be things I can see that would help and I can finally gather the right ingredients. Well, it’ll always be some trial and error, but—”

“Bitty—”

“—I’ve thought about this for a while and I think it’s the only way I can get close and—”

“Eric Richard Bittle!”

“—that’s what—did you just full-name me?”

Kent shrugs.

“You full-named me! You, Mr. Parson, are not my mother!”

“We can go to Montreal,” Kent says before Bitty starts rambling again. “If it’ll help Jack then… yes. Yes, we’ll go.”

The look on Bitty’s face is a strange mix between pleased and sad.

 

* * *

 

The home of Bob and Alicia Zimmermann isn’t as large as what Bitty had constructed in his mind. For some reason, he pictured marble and manicured gardens. Snow-covered gated drives and servants at the door. Instead, Bitty and Kent pulled up to a reasonably sized suburban home on the edge of the city.

Kent didn’t speak much the drive over from the airport. He turned the radio on as loud enough to drown out the sound of the highway and gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles blanched white. Now, as they step out onto the front walk, Bitty is afraid of how green Kent looks.

“They haven’t changed anything,” Kent says. He’s looking up to the second floor, where a single light is glowing yellow behind a closed curtain. Jack is a half-step in front of him, staring up at the very same window. He’s growing more solid, more aware. Bitty knows it must be because of where they are.

The front door opens and Bob Zimmermann is standing on the landing, eyebrows pinched and mouth screwed into a frown.

“Papa,” Jack says, but Bob can’t hear him. He can’t see him. Bob stares directly through his son to Kent and Bitty with a look that doesn’t feel entirely friendly. _“Papa.”_

Kent straightens his spine. It pains Bitty to see how hard it is for him to ignore Jack’s voice. “Mr. Zimmermann,” he says.

He and Bob appraise each other for a moment before he lets them inside. 

“I’m sorry for dropping by unannounced,” Kent says as they settle in the dining room.

“Who is this?” Bob says, motioning to Bitty. Alicia has joined beside her husband, worry marking lines on her face. They cling to each other like they need the other to float—Alicia’s hand on Bob’s shoulder, Bob’s wrapped around her waist. Jack has grown quiet and sullen, skin graying in the corner.

Before Bitty can introduce himself, Kent says, “Eric Bittle. He’s a friend.”

Bitty wants to say more, explain why he’s here, but Kent shoots him a look that makes him swallow his words. “Pleasure to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Zimmermann,” he says instead.

Alicia nods. "It's good to meet you too—"

“Is it?” Bob says. “What kind of pleasure is it?”

Alicia looks at her husband, fingers flexing around Bob's shirt, but not letting go. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to call after our game here last month,” Kent says. “I know you always like to go out for Alicia’s birthday and—”

“Why are you here?” Bob says.

Next to him, Kent shrinks back.

“Is it really so crazy for me to want to visit?” Kent says. “I don’t get a welcome? A _how have you been?”_

“It’s been years,” Bob says. “You wouldn’t come unless you wanted something.”

Kent’s face twists. “I _lived here_ for years. But that meant nothing to you.”

“It was hard for us, Kent,” Alicia says. “I'm so sorry, but you must have understood.”

“You cut me out.”

“I know you were hurting, son,” Bob says. “But the things you were saying weren’t good for Alicia or me to hear, for us to move on. It wasn’t good for you, either.”

“You didn’t listen to me.”

“We heard you, but—”

“No, you refused.”

Bitty looks from Kent to the Zimmermann’s—their faces gone pink with the crackle of long-held anger in the air. They don't believe Kent? In what? Jack?

Bitty sees it so clearly, now. Jack, wavering thin in shadows of the doorframe. Kent, trying his hardest not to fall apart.

Jack’s parents don’t believe his spirit is still here.

“It’s easier to live with a memory than a ghost,” Bitty says. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to listen, but it isn’t what’s best for your son.”

Alicia and Bob stare at Bitty like he’s some creature himself, come to haunt them.

“I don’t know who you think you are, but—”

“Eric Bittle,” Bitty says. “Seer and magical consultant. I should let you know, Jack can hear everything you’re saying right now.”

Alicia’s eyes go wide and Bob shakes his head. “No,” Bob says. “You can’t just walk in here and say things like that.”

“Honey, maybe we should hear them out,” Alicia says.

“No,” Bob says. “Absolutely not.”

Alicia’s eyes are still searching, flicking around the room. She’s biting her lip like she’s trying her best not to scream. She’s looking for her little boy.

“He’s here,” Kent says. “I’ve been telling you for years.”

Bob stands.

“Honey,” Alicia says, trying to pull him back. He shrugs her away.  

“You’re lying,” Bob says and walks out of the room.

 

When Bitty was small, he made snowflakes out of the muggy, Georgia heat. He mixed the cool of iced tea on a summer porch with the wide open sky and caught the falling flakes in his mouth.

His friends asked him what he was doing when they caught him outside, giggling up at the clouds.

“Can’t you see?” Bitty says. “It’s beautiful.”

They couldn't because they’re not Seers like Bitty, but they pretended they could. They joined Bitty in the summer snow, truly feeling the cool breeze that surrounds their play.

 

Bitty leads Alicia Zimmermann to her son, who stares back at her with cold ghost eyes. She can’t touch him, but she knows in her heart that he’s there. That some of him is there, in that room, and she starts to cry.

Jack reaches out but his hands pass through her tear-streaked face.

“You do need something from us, don’t you?” she says to Kent. “Whatever it is, I’ll help.”

 

Alicia shows Bitty and Kent up to the room that was once Jack’s. She leaves them there while she goes to talk to Bob downstairs.

It isn’t much more than a guest room now—simple blue covers over a full sized bed with a dresser and nightstand. The few things that remain are a shelf full of old trophies and pucks, a chair covered by a Canadian flag, and a few posters scattered around the walls.

Bitty picks up a puck in the center that’s buzzing with energy. It almost burns to his touch.

“That was from the Memorial Cup,” Kent says. “Our coach gave it to me for scoring the winning goal, but Jack stole it from me when we got back home.”

“Liar,” Jack says. Bitty turns and sees Jack sitting on the edge of a bed that was once his. “You gave it to me.”

“I gave it to you after you were whining about it the whole trip.”

“It was not whining,” Jack says. “I was just _suggesting_ that we share it since, you know, I _did_ get more goals than you that game.”

“Every opportunity to rub that in,” Kent says.

Bitty feels the strength of the emotions etched into the puck and sees how present Jack is when in his space. The connections between Jack and Kent—what he sees as red threads vibrating between them like strummed guitar strings—are filling the room. They make webs that knot into the shelves and posters and the sheets.

“Canadiens?” Bitty says, pointing at the poster above the bed.

“Of course,” Kent says. “His family would disown him if he supported anyone else _, eh?”_

“I’m from here,” Jack says. “Habs makes sense.”

“But you wouldn’t have played for them in the NHL if you were drafted,” Bitty says.

“I remember what you always said,” Kent says. “Anyone but—”

“The Bruins,” Jack says like it’s an inside joke. Kent even chuckles at it.

“You never change.”

“At least you won the last time,” Jack says. “Your home game wasn’t pretty.”

“Oh, fuck off.”

The red strings around the room vibrate.

“Do you remember everything that happens?” Bitty asks Jack.

“It’s not—it isn’t all there,” Jack says. “It’s like a dream. Or, waking up from a dream, every day.”

Kent looks away. Bitty grips the puck harder.

“Is it bad?” Bitty says.

“Bad?” Jack says. He thinks. “No, bad isn’t the right word. I know I’m not supposed to be here and I get…” He looks off to his shelves full of old trophies. “Restless?”

“Do you know what will help you move on?” Bitty asks. He hears Kent shuffle behind him.

“I don’t know,” Jack says. “Dreams never make any sense.”

 

Bitty works his way through the objects in Jack’s old room, feeling for the magic that ties Jack to this world. He watches the strings around him shimmer and snap and rewire around an old phone he finds in a drawer and a high school history book forgotten under the bed.

Kent has wandered off to let Bitty do his work. He places the puck in his bag, next to a well-worn knit cap and a small pair of skates he finds in the closet that must have been his very first pair. He takes his time with each item he finds. A jacket he leaves hanging, a stuffed toy he turns over in his hands before returning to its corner, a water bottle that, for some reason, shines glossy with magic. He thinks about sentiment and wishes. About disappointment and burden. Bitty weaves these objects into a pattern he can read, trying to figure out how to break Jack’s mooring. To set him free.

After some time, Bitty decides he needs to look at more of the house before planning the final elements of the ritual.

“Kent?” he says, stepping out into the hall. “Where are you?”

Bitty walks toward the stairs, taking a look at the family portraits that line the wall. The light is on in the bathroom, but the door is open.

“Kent, we should—”

Bitty stops cold in the doorway.

There, on the floor, is Jack. He’s fading in and out of clarity, sprawled across the tile. Even when he’s solid, he’s pale—lips turning blue as his breathing slows. He flickers, the strings around him tighten, and he opens his eyes. “Kenny,” he says before slipping away again.

Kent is watching, leaning on the sink and looking like he might pass out.

“Lord. Kent, hun—”

“I’ve seen this enough times,” Kent says, throat tight around the words. “It’s always the same.”

Bitty reaches out, wanting to do what? To steady him? He wants to say that everything will be alright, but that’s a lie. He wants to promise he’ll make it go away, but all he can do is try. When his fingers brush against Kent’s elbow, Kent flinches away.

“Don’t,” he says. “I can’t stay in this fucking house any longer.”

“I need more time.”

Kent closes his eyes, shakes his head. “I can’t do it.”

“Kent, please.”

“You stay then,” he says. “I’ll just—I can come back and get you, but I can’t do it. I can’t.”

Kent shoves past him to get out of the bathroom and down the stairs. Bitty hears the front door slam.

 

Jack disappears as soon as Kent leaves, but Bitty stays in that bathroom for a little longer, trying to understand. The air is soggy with residual magic, but Bitty already knew Jack wasn’t tied to this house. He isn’t tied to any one object. It is more of an idea that the ghost is fixated on—an idea that rests inside Kent—and he’s just reacting to whatever is going on around him.

Bitty pads down the stairs and meets Alicia going up.

“You’re still here,” Alicia says.

“Kent needed a break,” Bitty says. “Sorry, I’m still imposing. I’ll be on my way soon.”

“No!” Alicia says. She claps a hand over her mouth. “No, I mean, only if—do you think you can help him?”

Bitty looks Alicia Zimmermann over. Still a beauty, but frozen, somehow. Like part of her heart is still living in a house ten years gone.

He takes her arm. “How about we go sit down?” he says. “And you can tell me about your son.”

 

* * *

 

Jack’s favorite ice cream flavor was vanilla and he’d unapologetically order it in a cup every time they went out with the team, even though they chirped him for being boring as they stacked their cones high with nuts and sprinkles. Jack’s favorite music to put on in the car as they drove to practice was terrible Canadian country—partly because he liked it, and partly because it drove Kent crazy. Jack always did the dishes after dinner because his father cooked and his mother went shopping for groceries and on some level, every family unit was a team as well.

Jack liked pleasing people. He only annoyed Kent like he did because he knew that Kent liked the attention.

Jack was terrified of falling but was also terrifying of moving forward. When he reached the part of his life that the height seemed the greatest, the fall had been the deadliest.

Driving the old route out of the back roads of Montreal, Kent watches at Jack out of the corner of his vision and he realizes he’s so young. He looks like a kid by any standard, someone Kent would take under his wing if he joined up with the Aces as a rookie. Sad eyes now staring out at nothing at all.

 

* * *

 

“I knew about the boys,” Alicia tells Bitty. “I knew they were going to tear each other apart. I just didn’t expect it to be like this.”

“They must have been close,” Bitty says.

Alicia looks at him, face grave. “Kent loves with all of himself. He thought nobody would notice, but I’m a mother. I know what it looks like when that boy’s fallen.”

“You worried about what that would mean for Jack.”

“Eric,” Alicia says. “Right now, I’m worried about _you.”_

 

* * *

 

Kent drives back as the sun goes down. When he gets to the door, Bitty opens it for him. When he smiles, it’s warm and friendly and makes Kent feel guilty for leaving him. He wants to say so but doesn’t know how to word it so it won’t come out sounding like self-pity.

“I’ll call you, Alicia,” Bitty says as she appears behind him.

She nods. When she turns to Kent, he notices her eyes are rimmed with red, like she was crying. She pulls something off the table in the hall. “Take this,” she says. “I think it was yours, anyway.”

Kent reaches for an old sweatshirt, too small for him to fit into now, but just barely. It’s blue with a red logo on the front of a sports shop he can’t remember anymore. What he does remember is that it was soft and Jack would steal it at any opportunity he could. He took it from his bag on long bus rides and curled himself up with his headphones in and hood pulled up. At a point Kent can’t pick out now looking back, it became _theirs_ more than his alone.

“Thank you,” Kent says.

After they get into the car and start to drive, it takes time for either of them to speak.

“So, uh,” Kent says. “You spoke to Alicia.”

“We chatted,” Bitty says. “I baked.”

Kent smiles. “Of course you did.”

“I made Bob Zimmermann a pie,” Bitty says. “I baked forgiveness into the crust.”

“I don’t forgive him.”

“It isn’t _my_ forgiveness,” Bitty says. “It’s his. I hope he chokes on it.”

Kent lets out a laugh and it feels like it releases something in his chest. “So, where to now?”  

 

* * *

 

Recipe for the release of a lost spirit, by Mary Phelps (1756). _Revised by Eric Bittle (2016)_

Ingredients

  1. A love-worn gift from a parent who has learned how to grieve
  2. Five memories woven from five different minds
  3. The flame of hope a friend still carries in their breast
  4. An object of expectation, as heavy an object as can fit in a pocket
  5. Stardust caught by someone who was and someone who could have been



 

* * *

 

 Bitty directs Kent along the Saint Lawrence River until the houses start to dwindle along the road and they’re left with open forest. They stop to grab dinner while they drive—nothing more than a couple roadside sandwiches—and drive into the steadily gathering dark.

They finally park in a place where a break in the trees reveals a field leading down to a lakeside. The brush is still the dry and leafless expanse of mid-winter, but a recent melt has kept the soil damp.

Kent is bundled up in many layers to ward off the cold as he follows Bitty down the path. He pulls his scarf over his mouth and stuffs his hands into his jacket pockets. The cold isn’t something he has to deal with often in Vegas, so even this deep chill feels like a memory.

The snow is gone, for the time being, so everything Kent can see is made of shades of brown and black and yellow. Except… in the light of the moon now high up in the sky and the inky black of the night, the world has turned an otherworldly blue. It feels as if the sky has shattered and spilled across the land when they get closer to the lake. But even surrounded by nature so different than home, he can’t keep his eyes on the tree line.

As they walk the 500 meters to the waterline, Kent watches Bitty. The steam of his breath makes clouds around his face, and when he turns to point up at the sky, Kent’s mouth goes a little dry. There’s so much life in him—every chirp, every frown, every little curl of his fingers he does when he’s upset but doesn’t want to show it. If Kent could drink him in—if Bitty had a tonic for that—he’d do it in a heartbeat.

“Hun, did you hear me?” Bitty’s saying. “Can you take the other side of this?”

Bitty holds out the side of a large net. Kent would say it reminds him of a fishing net, but he’d never been fishing so he wouldn’t know. It was large and loose and they got to work setting it out on pegs driven into the earth.

“And do we just… wait?” Kent asks.

Bitty looks up at the nearly cloudless sky as if he can tell just by looking when a shooting star will fall. Though, on second thought, he probably could.

“We wait,” he says.

Kent hunches his shoulders against the icy wind. The tree branches dance in the distance and a crow calls somewhere off to their right. Kent wonders what it would be like, to see magic everywhere. He thinks it would be less lonesome if these distant places off the map were so filled with wonder that he could ignore the ache in his chest that told him he had nobody to share it with except a ghost.

He could share it with Bitty, for now. But he’d be gone soon too if everything went as they planned. Bitty would leave to work on someone else’s problem and he would be utterly and truly alone, without even Jack to keep him company.

Kent jumps as he feels Bitty move closer to his side, leaning his head against Kent’s shoulder, still looking up at the sky. He looks cold—his ears are turning pink and he’s shuffling his feet. His hand is brushing Kent’s thigh and he doesn’t think Bitty notices. Kent wants to reach out and grab it, warm it between his if they both have to suffer the weather anyway, but he doesn’t. He just lets Bitty lean against him and hopes that he’s helping in some way.

“Can you smell it?” Bitty asks.

“Smell what?” All Kent can smell is damp clay.

“It’s starting,” Bitty says. “To me, it smells like the first sparks of a fire. Oh! Look!”

Kent blinks. The sky is as black as ever.

No, wait. There. A shooting star appears and falls away. One, then another. They’re falling faster than he’s ever seen them before.

“Listen,” Bitty says.

“What, I don’t—”

“Shh,” Bitty says. He tugs on Kent’s arm. “Just listen.”

It’s soft, but it’s there if he concentrates. A tinkling sound, like bells off in another room. He wants to look at the net but knows he won’t see much. Instead, he watches Bitty’s face as the Seer watches the magic happen around them.

When Bitty’s face brightens, Kent takes a breath. He pulls his hand out of his pocket and wraps Bitty’s fingers in his. He says nothing but buries his face in Kent’s jacket.

There’s suddenly enough heat in Kent’s stomach to warm him for hours.

 

* * *

 

“That’s the reason you never told anyone, isn’t it?” Bitty says as they fill the glass jars he brought with the fruits of their night. The moon is still high as they’re packing the back of the car. Stardust ranges from round grape-sized balls to fine, multicolored grains—each a small prism shooting arrays of color around them. When they pour, the dust fills the air around them and Bitty tries not to sneeze.

“The Zimmermanns?” Kent says.

“They didn’t believe you.”

Kent shrugs. “It wouldn’t have done me any good to tell. In the league—anything can be used against you. Whether I was telling the truth or not, it was going to be a liability. I couldn’t do that. Not if Jack’s happiness relied on how well I did.”

“They were terrible to you.”

“No, they just didn’t understand,” Kent says. “I didn’t either. When they didn’t believe me, I thought, yeah, maybe I am just crazy.”

Bitty tightens the lid on one jar and starts on another. “Magic has a long history with the word crazy,” he says. “People tend to use that word as a weapon.”

Kent’s hand trembles, but he doesn’t spill the dust. “I would never,” Kent says. “I know—I’ve seen what saying that sort of shit does and I couldn’t.”

“So, why do you say it to yourself?”

Kent hands the next finished jar over to Bitty. “Because on some level, it will always be true. It could have just as easily been me on that bathroom floor. Me, a ghost. I was just as fucked up as Jack.”

Bitty closes the last jar and packs them in a box lined with blankets so they won’t chip if they rattle against each other. “All the more reason for them to have cared.”

“No,” Kent says. “Exactly the reason they were right to stop speaking to me.”

Bitty shuts the trunk with a bang. He shouldn’t be handling stardust when he’s angry, but he can’t help it. There are things they whisper about people with magic, especially people who can see what others can’t.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” Bitty says.

Kent twists his fingers into the car keys. “I’ve already come to terms with who I was back then,” he says. “There wasn’t a lot I could ignore with Jack there with me every waking minute. I was drinking a lot, I wasn’t sleeping. It wasn’t healthy. _I_ wasn’t healthy. That has nothing to do with magic at all.”

Bitty tries to bite his tongue, but he still speaks with harsher words than he would have liked. “Bless you, you think this is all just a game,” he spits. “That I must _enjoy_ being out here with you in the cold.”

Kent looks stricken. Bitty steamrolls on.

“Magic has everything to do with how you felt or Jack wouldn’t have latched onto you at all,” Bitty says.

Kent sputters. “How I _feel_ has nothing to do with magic. Magic just feeds on it.”

Bitty throws his hands up. “Oh, goodness, of course. You must know more than me.” He climbs into the passenger seat so he doesn’t say anymore.

He tries to ignore the hurt look on Kent’s face as he starts the car engine.

 

* * *

 

Kent tries hard to keep his hands to himself when he and Bitty part ways at the airport. He was so stupid to think Bitty thought of this as anything more than a job. Kent had paid for his tickets, paid for the car. Paid for those soft smiles and encouragements, _we’ll find a way, Kent. Don’t you worry._

Why did he think this was any different than the friends he had back in Vegas who hung around because they knew his paycheck was in the millions? _“Friends.”_ At least they try to lie to him to make him feel less alone. Bitty? Kent is nothing more than a client.

When Bitty holds out his arms for a hug at the gate, Kent takes his hand for a shake and shoots him his winning Playboy smile.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kent and Bitty get stuck in a snowstorm. They talk about magic and pies made from rainbows and what kisses really mean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a good week!! Yuzuru Hanyu won gold, it was 70 degrees yesterday in Boston (???), and I'm getting strawberry shortcake for my birthday tomorrow. 
> 
> Now I could study for my endo exam, but I'll probably just end up staying up late to watch the ladies FS and some more Yuzu highlights. Oops. The Olympics are killing me.

“I don’t get it.”

Bitty is spread out on the floor of Lardo’s studio, watching her paint. He should be researching an essay, but that would require him to go to the library and it’s -5 outside. That, and he’s lazy. And upset.

“Don’t get what?” Lardo says. She has a streak of yellow across her cheek.

“Kent. I thought we were—well, I don’t know. Maybe not friends, but friendly? Now he’s ignoring my calls or sayin’ he has to go after five minutes.”

“The Aces have been on a bit of a losing streak,” Lardo says. “Maybe it’s not about you.”

Bitty sighs and plays with a stray brush that fell from a table. “He hasn’t sent me a single picture of Kit in a week. When he’s sad, he usually dresses Kit up and makes her pose on the kitchen counter with—”

“Bitty,” Lardo says. “Why are _you_ so upset?”

“He’s _coming here_ soon. We have to interview a few people who knew Jack back when they were in the Q and I have to deal with… whatever’s going on with him in person.”

Bitty wants to confess that it hurts more because of where he thought they were going when they were in Montreal. He knows they had an argument, but it was about _magic,_ wasn’t it? About his ability to do his job and of course Bitty wouldn’t back down. And Kent seemed fine. He acted fine.

Bitty thinks of the touches, the secret looks, the long car rides with Kent’s sunglasses down and the radio blaring. And now, Kent looks like he wants nothing at all to do with Bitty. But he knows that if he says all that out loud, he’ll come across as another one of Kent’s pining fans. He’d rather die.

“There must be a reason he’s acting like he is,” Lardo says. “He seemed a reasonable dude when I met him.”

“Doesn’t matter. He can sulk all he wants, but I have a job to do. I’m not going to let his moods get in the way.

 

* * *

 

“What happened?” Scraps says at dinner. “Break up with your girl?”

Kent nearly chokes on his roll. “What girl?”

“Girl you were always texting on roadies,” he says. “Bro, you may be secretive as shit, but you were being pretty obvious.”

Kent doesn’t know what to say. He picks at his desecrated bread and tries for as close to the truth as he can. “Never my girl,” he says. “Thought—well, not sure what I thought, but they don’t feel the same.”

Jeff catches Kent’s eye from across the table and tries to ignore the worried look.

“Oh, man,” Scraps says. “Sorry, I didn’t know.”

Kent shoves the rest of the roll in his mouth.

 

* * *

 

It’s snowing again by the time Kent arrives in Boston on his red-eye. After delays and circling around to land in the decreased visibility, he finally disembarks three hours after he was scheduled to. He’s tired, hungry, and doesn’t know how he’s going to survive the 24 hours he’s meant to be here before climbing on a plane back to Vegas.

He drags his bag over his shoulder and hurries out of the terminal.

Bitty’s there, waiting for him with a sign that says _Go Bruins._

“Betrayed,” Kent says. “You’re not even a Bruins fan.”

“I might be,” Bitty says.

Kent can’t tell how much of Bitty’s face was teasing and how much was genuine annoyance. “I’m so sorry I’m late.”

Bitty shoved the sign into Kent’s hands. “You can’t control the weather,” he says. “But to make up for it, you have to carry that all the way to the car.”

“I’m definitely going to hear from PR about this.”

He follows Bitty to the parking garage all the while ducking anyone who seems like they might be a hockey fan with access to a camera. Which, it turns out, is a lot of people at Logan airport. Though, he’s also got a lot of practice with ducking, so he thinks he’s doing very well for himself.

Bitty looks pleased when Kent hides behind a trash bin.

“Oh, give that back, you absolute fool,” Bitty says.

“I deserve this.”

“You do, but we’re also very close to my car,” Bitty says.

Kent concedes.

He thought their reunion would more stilted or awkward. Kent has been keeping himself at arm’s length for the couple weeks since Montreal, but it’s so easy to want to make Bitty laugh. To see that doe-eyed grin and convince himself that maybe this is what friendship is. So, despite his better judgement, Kent feels himself falling victim to his own need to be wanted.

Bitty’s car is not at all what Kent imagined. A bit tired and—for lack of a better term—rugged. He realizes that he did see the pick-up truck parked outside the house when he went before, but he thinks it fits Lardo’s style much more than Bitty’s.

“Nice truck,” Kent says.

“Shush, it does its job.”

As long as the radio works and the car moves forward, Kent can’t complain.

 

* * *

 

Their first stop is in Cambridge, where one of Kent’s old Q teammates now lives. He never went pro, but has been coaching youth leagues out in the suburbs. He’s also one of the few people Kent can think of that knew Jack well enough to help.

“Parse, man, anything I can do to help an old mate,” Berger says. “Been meaning to get to one of your games.”

“Let me know and I’ll get you tickets.”

“Thanks, man,” Berger says. “Jack though? Haven’t thought about him for ages. Not since, well, you know.”

Bitty leans forward, hands clasped together like a prayer. “What do you remember about him?”

Berger seems a little uncomfortable but tries to hide it with a chin wiggle and a look down his nose like hanging out with NHL players is something that happens to him all the time. “Bit of a quiet kid. He was one of the local guys, so didn’t hang out much with the kids in Billet homes. Hell of a player though. It was all anyone talked about that last year. Well, you and Jack both, Parse.” Berger tips his head at Kent. “He was a fine captain but wasn’t much in terms of inspiration. He knew the game, knew what would win, but he made Parse here make speeches for him.”

“That’s not—” Kent says, but Berger cuts him off.

“Dude only talked to you,” Berger says. “So maybe you didn’t notice but he was sort of… awkward.”

A look passes over Kent’s face like he’s struggling with that information.

“There was this one night after a game in Toronto. We’re all drinking in one of the rooms and Jack shows up already fucking plastered,” Berger says. Bitty can see Kent shift in his seat, a frown forming at the corner of his lips. “I guess I’d seen him drink at some of the parties we’d had, but man, he was falling over himself. It was the first time I’d ever seen him volunteer to get up in front of everyone like that. Fucking singing praises, I thought he was going to cry. Spent at least ten minutes on how beautifully you played that day.”

“I—” Kent says. “I don’t remember that.”

“Really?” Berger says. “Think you spent that whole night making sure Jack didn’t vomit all over the floor.”

Berger laughs like it’s a joke, but Kent goes very quiet.

“One thing’s for sure though, Jack could play some good fucking hockey,” Berger says. He leans back in his chair and closes his eyes like he’s basking in the memory. “A natural, that kid. Wish I could coach someone like that. He just saw things other people didn’t. And when you were on his line? Unstoppable.”

 

* * *

 

Bitty suggests going to a diner for lunch—one of those places with novel-length menus and every kind of cold-cut combination possible with eggs on top—and Kent agrees enthusiastically. He hadn’t eaten since in-flight peanuts and he thinks he might pass out.

“Please tell me that was worth it,” Kent says as they slide into the booth.

“I think it’ll work,” Bitty says. “As long as the stories are different and not entirely what _you_ remember, we can work with them.”

Kent shakes his head. “Berger was one of those guys who could get hit in the head a hundred times and still skate straight,” he says. “Impressed that he got as far as he did with hockey since he never exactly played smart. Hope he’s a decent coach.”

“I take it he wasn’t a friend,” Bitty says.

“You are correct.”

When their food comes, Kent is quick to inhale his sandwich and _god_ it’s good. It would have tasted good regardless, but this is something else. So salty. So much meat. Bitty, meanwhile, looks several miles more dignified than him, actually cutting his sandwich in half before taking a bite.

“Do you ever get people asking for autographs?” Bitty asks. “Wearing that hat seems like an invitation.”

Kent hardly thinks about Aces cap he has on. It’s convenience more than a brand. Definitely not a brand he’s particularly keen on represented as of late anyway. Unruly hair can be hidden and he doesn’t have to worry. “I could just be another Vegas fan,” Kent says. “And if someone recognizes my face, they would regardless of the logo.”

The snow is accumulating outside and the diner is quieter than Kent thinks is normal. Here, at least, he doesn’t think he’ll be approached. He usually knows the sorts of venues he needs to be on alert—sports bars, fundraising events, large public venues where people are more likely to call out into the crowd _Isn’t that…?_

“But the fans, do they annoy you?”

“I wish I could turn it off sometimes and be completely anonymous,” Kent says. “But it’s part of the job and I’m usually fine with it.”

Bitty takes another bite of food and crosses his legs under the table. His foot touches the back of Kent’s calf, though Kent doesn’t think he’s aware of it. Kent tries to ignore it.

“Why do you want to leave the Aces?” Bitty asks. “All the experts keep saying your game is growing with the franchise. I can see your playing is great.”

Kent licks mayo from his fingers. “What people see is the outside, right? Play good hockey and it must all be alright on the other side.”

“You mean the management.”

“There have been so many times I’ve wanted to make a change in the ways things are done,” Kent says. “Small things, just to make the environment more… livable. There’s only so much I can do from the player’s side as captain and I’m sick of it.”

“Will it really be different if you go somewhere else?” Bitty asks.

“I don’t know,” Kent says. “But at least I’ll have a choice if I talk to other teams. I’m not an idiot, I know I’ll be getting some calls.”

“What are you looking for?”

“There are a lot of things, it isn’t just this,” Kent says. He sighs. “I don’t want to come out, at least I don’t right now, but with the Aces? It wouldn’t be possible. I nudged them about the possibility a couple years back and got the hardest no you can imagine.”

“Oh, Kent, that’s—”

“Exactly what I expected, honestly. League standard,” Kent says. “But it’s more than that. They think they can control everything I am. I want to be somewhere I feel a little more like myself.”

Bitty places a hand on Kent’s knee under the table and gives it a squeeze. The touch is grounding and solid and it makes Kent feel a bit like he wants to scream.

“I don’t know what professional playing is like,” Bitty says. “But I know that feeling.”

 

* * *

 

It takes all of Bitty’s concentration to not drive his truck off the road. The snow has started falling fast and the tires are slipping at every turn. He takes each intersection inch by inch and even then, horns start honking as he drifts into the other lane.

“Bitty…” Kent says. He’s gripping the dashboard like it’ll be the difference between making it across the city or ending up in a snowdrift. “Bitty, I think we need to stop.”

“We still have one more place to—”

“Bitty!”

He swerves out of the way of a snowplow.

“Ok,” Bitty says. “Ok, we should—uh—find a garage.”

“Thank fuck.”

It takes some more circling to find somewhere to park, but they do eventually, Kent pulling out some larger bills and a, _please we’re going to die_ like the dramatic fool he is. They’re too far from the café they were heading to meet Kent’s other old Q contact to walk, but he gets a call as they’re parking that he’s stuck in his driveway and won’t be able to make it anyway. Kent suggests finding a hotel to camp out at until the snow lets up.

“The stores are all closing,” Kent says. “It isn’t like we could have met up even if he did get up here.”

The streets are deserted. Bitty’s glad he wore his tougher boots, but Kent looks uncomfortable in his sneakers that were clearly not made for winter weather.

“Still, you came all this way.”

“One is a good start.”

They stumble into the common, white covering the now desolate frog pond and trees shaking icicles from their limbs when the wind sweeps through.

“I’m sorry you can’t get back to school,” Kent says.

“It’s fine, I can miss one lit seminar,” Bitty says. “Probably canceled by now anyway.”

“English lit, American history,” Kent says, using his fingers to list off Bitty’s classes. “Some sort of food seminar I’m still not sure counts as real school, hockey, and a bit of magic expert consulting on the side?”

“And a required stats class I may fail.” Bitty makes a face.

“Why?”

“Because math isn’t exactly playing to my strengths and—”

“No,” Kent says. “Why school? Why does a southern boy come so far north to study statistics and food history to practice magic?”

Bitty looks at Kent through the thickly falling snow. He’s always amazed at how quiet it gets during a storm like someone snuck cotton balls in his ears. Now, it feels like it’s just him and Kent in a bubble protected from the rest of the world. A cold, slippery bubble, but alone nonetheless. He wonders how much of this is Kent really caring and how much of it is him making elevator small talk in the middle of a park.

“I don’t know if this sounds silly,” Bitty says.

Kent looks at him with such intensity, nodding to go on, that Bitty can’t help himself.

“There was this split in the way American magicians do their craft, see. Branches of practice forming hundreds of years ago that still affect what tonics we brew and what rituals we perform. I was brought up in a very Southern style, but as a Seer, I noticed that I couldn’t explain all the magic I felt around me.”

“So you came up here to get a different perspective?”

“Yes, partially. Massachusetts has a strength in Northern magic. But also...” Bitty trails off. They’re silent for a time, the crunching of their shoes in the unmarked snow a pleasure in itself. “This may be hard for someone without much magic background to get, but, the sort of magic I do? It’s considered feminine. My grandmother taught me and I took to it well, I never wanted to do anything else, but a lot of the rest of my family talked.”

“Does it not have the same connotation in Northern practice?” Kent asks, and bless him for trying to understand.

“It does,” Bitty explains. “But it doesn’t matter as much? Lord, it’s not like I don’t know how I look. Baking rainbows into my pies won't make me any gayer than I already am.”

“Holy shit,” Kent says. “You can bake a rainbow pie?”

“Essence of rainbow _inside_ a pie to capture that smell after rain and—”

“Can I have a rainbow pie?”

“I feel like you’re missing the point.”

Kent laughs and it fills the whole space of their little bubble and Bitty is secretly thankful that the snow will eat up the sound because he wants to be the only person in the world to hear it.

“I’m glad you told me,” Kent says. “I do like hearing about magic, you know. Especially when it doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

They’re nearing the street on the other side of the commons where they’ve called ahead for a hotel room. It’s one of those fancier places that Bitty’s only seen from the outside and wondered who stayed there. Apparently, NHL players who are guilty over a snowstorm.

Kent slips on a curb, hands flailing as he tries to right himself. Bitty catches hold of his arm, dragging him up.

“And here I thought you were good on ice.”

“Shut up.”

Bitty sticks out his tongue. But as Kent is straightening up, he grabs Bitty behind, picking him up and spinning him around until they both land in the snow together. The cold is sudden and fresh in the back of his neck and the wind rushes from his mouth.

“Kent!” he gasps.

“Who’s good now?”

Bitty rolls over and piles snow between his hands to throw into Kent’s face. Kent sputters and tries to run away, but Bitty follows on his heels, skidding along pathways until he can catch the back of his coat.

He wishes there was a way to stop time at this moment. For them to live in a little snow globe of a life, here, forever. Kent, turning at the last moment and catching Bitty in his arms, the rush of adrenaline kicking in behind his tongue.

 

They finally make it to the hotel, soaked to the bone and shivering. Bitty is more than a little self-conscious of his state as the hotel staff glare at the puddle he’s made in the middle of the lobby, but Kent seems unfazed. They check in and head up to the room where Bitty is looking forward to a warm shower.

Those plans are derailed as soon as Bitty watches Kent strip off first his wet jacket, followed by his shirt. And goodness, if Bitty didn’t already know his type so well he may have had a heart attack. It isn’t fair, not really. Because if he was alone in his room behind the safety of a computer screen, he wouldn’t feel so guilty about staring. But Kent—he doesn’t exactly know what to call him, but he sure isn’t another celebrity to fawn over from afar. He’s _here_ and he’s certainly good to look at, but that twitch inside his breast when he smiles at him isn’t at all normal for Bitty looking at any other attractive man.

And now, Kent is watching him stare, but Bitty doesn’t have the capacity to stop. Kent moves toward him, a single stutter-step that Bitty feels like he should chirp, before shrinking back.

“I’m sorry I’m dragging you around the cold again,” Kent says.

“Hm?”

“I know this probably isn’t your idea of fun,” Kent says slowly, wringing out his shirt in the sink and grabbing a towel for his hair. “That you’d rather we’d just had both our meetings so you could head back to school.”

His voice is soft and tentative and Bitty has no idea what he means.

“We have time,” Bitty says. “We have more people to gather stories from and I’m still not sure about a couple of the ingredients so it isn’t too bad for me to process one at a time anyway.”

“I don’t care about the—” Kent runs his hands through his damp hair. “When we were in Montreal, you said you wouldn’t want to spend time with me unless it was for the job.”

Bitty frowns and tries to think back to their trip. “I’m sure I didn’t say it like that.”

“Doesn’t matter how you said it. Did you mean it?”

_No_ , Bitty wants to shout. _I don’t want this to end. I don’t want to keep finding excuses to spend time with you._ But Bitty doesn’t think he can manage that without looking like a complete star-struck idiot, so he measures his voice. “This isn’t so bad, Kent Parson.”

But Kent looks almost disappointed by that answer. His mouth twitches down as he pulls a dry shirt over his head. “Bitty, I—” Kent says, then stops. Screws up his face like he’s drinking bitter medicine. “You’re great, you know that? I’m really glad I found you.”

Bitty isn’t sure what to say to that. “I’m just doing my job.”

“Your job,” Kent repeats. “Right. But that’s just it, I don’t want it to be just a job. I don’t want to just be another one of your projects.” He steps closer to Bitty and he’s suddenly very aware of the heat creeping up his neck.

“What do you want, then?”

Kent’s eyes are pleading. He reaches out slowly and runs his hand along Bitty’s neck before coming to a stop at his collarbone. Bitty shivers. “More,” Kent says.

Bitty closes his eyes and leans into the touch.

And Kent kisses him, slow and sweet and endless. Bitty can taste the Boston blizzard on his lips mixed with worry, but also want and need and impatience. There are long sleepy flights and tired limbs in that kiss, waiting and waiting and waiting. Yearning for home. To rest on another’s shoulder or cuddle under pillows rustling with a lover’s breath.

Bitty grabs Kent’s arm to pull him closer and his muscles are lean and hard and for a moment he’s distracted enough to let their lips part, but Bitty captures them again. He wants to drown in this feeling. Float away and become nothing but this.

When Kent finally pulls away enough for them both to breathe, Bitty smiles into his neck. “Bitty?” Kent says.

Bitty looks up. Kent’s cheeks are flushed and his eyes dark. Suddenly, Bitty feels small again, like he’s six years old and his uncle is shooing him from the kitchen. Like he’s seven or eight and stunned on the ground, trying to catch his breath as his cousins stand around him. _I didn’t even hit him that hard._ His magic is what always calms them, pleases them. He hadn’t done enough for Kent yet and so he doesn’t deserve Kent’s attention.

Bitty pushes Kent away.

“Look at me,” Kent says, fingers on his chin. “Bits, I’m—what’s wrong?”

He can’t handle it. It’s years of voices in his head saying, _not good enough_ and needing to hide the style his magic took so he wouldn’t be called a fag. Denying his femininity and not wanting to be called beautiful, even if something in his bones wished for it. Especially from the lips of someone like Kent.

Everyone wants Bitty for something. He’d escaped the south, but he hadn’t escaped that reality. If he provides and provides and makes everyone happy, he’ll be accepted. He’ll be loved.

“I thought—fuck,” Kent says. His hand balls into a fist and turns away. Quieter. “It’s been so long and I—fuck, I read this wrong.”

_No, you didn’t._

“Just forget that I—” Kent says. He presses his fist to his forehead. “Forget it.”

“Just tell me what you want,” Bitty says. His voice is tight and the words come out harsh.

Kent’s folding into himself like he’s trying to hide. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“I know you want me to weave magic to dispel a spirit,” Bitty says. “I know you think I’m the only one who can do it. What I don’t get is _this._ If it’s pity, or a way to control—you’re going to get the magic you want, Kent.”

“I’m not—what? Why would you say that?”

Because anytime anyone is nice to him, gives him the attention he craves, there’s a question at the end. A request. Something Bitty can’t say no to anymore. Lardo had been an exception to that, as had most of SMH, though he _still_ has trouble saying no to them.

“You want something.”

“Yes,” Kent says. “I want you.”

“For?”

“For nothing!” Kent says. “I just—I like you, Bitty. Why is that so hard to understand?”

“You’re Kent Parson,” Bitty deflects. He must know what he means—there are billboards with his face on it, ads on TV showing off his muscles, his smile on many a young fan’s wall. He always gets what he wants. Maybe, except, for this.

“Exactly,” Kent says. “Fucking—I’m a gay professional athlete in a homophobic sport and I’m being haunted by my ex. What makes you think—”

“I know, but—”

“You are one of maybe four people in the world who knows both of those facts,” Kent says. “And you’re the _only one_ who is _still here.”_

Kent’s breathing hard and it’s the only sound in the room for a moment. Bitty didn’t know that. Bitty can’t think of himself as special.

“I wouldn’t be if you gave others a chance,” Bitty says. He wants to tell Kent that he’s worth it. That he’d be worth it to a hundred different people if he could see what he does to others. But Kent looks like he’s about to cry and Bitty isn’t brave enough to close the distance and put his hand on his face to calm him.

“If you’re only humoring me because—” Kent says. “Because I’m famous or some shit, I’m leaving. I can’t—I don’t want to deal with—”

“Oh, hun, be quiet,” Bitty says.

“I have enough of that with—”

“It isn’t _about_ that, Kent,” Bitty says. He wants so much to touch him again—to feel that light-headed giddiness and just sink. Let himself sink so deep he doesn’t have to worry.

He takes a tentative step forward.

“It always seems to be about that,” Kent says.

“I don’t care what you do on the ice.” Bitty laughs. “I’ve never been much of an Aces fan anyway.”

Kent still looks confused. Scared. Bitty reaches up. If Kent really believes that it isn’t the magic, maybe Bitty can believe it too. He can open his heart just enough to hope that he won’t be burned.

He stands on his tip-toes to bring Kent into a kiss.

“Don’t be,” Kent says when they part, breath on his cheek. He looks relieved while his eyes are still bordering on pooling over and he exhales. “Please, never be an Aces fan.”

“Can’t promise that.”

 

* * *

 

They both finally shower and change and watch the snow accumulate outside the window, ten floors down. Kent doesn’t want to go further than kisses and skin today, he already feels so unsteady. Bitty is like fire and he’s so afraid that if he stays too close, he’ll burn.

So, instead, they cuddle under the blankets of one of the twin beds and watch a movie they buy on demand. Bitty’s legs tangle with his and his hair fluffs up and tickles Kent’s nose. When Bitty twists to reposition himself an hour into the film, Kent wraps his arms around his chest and lets him lean on him. They stay like that—so close that they can feel each other’s heartbeats.

 

* * *

 

“Every time I smell vodka, I see Jack on the floor again. I _see_ him. He’s dying right there in front of me and there’s fucking nothing I can do because it isn’t just me. It’s him. He’s really hurting again and it’s my fault.”

Bitty is holding Kent’s hand as he talks into the darkness. They’ve been putting off sleep like this since the movie credits rolled and they flicked off the lights.

“Every time I take a bad hit on the ice, he’s the first one there to see if I’m alright. Every time, I have to remind myself to not say his name. To not look at him. I’m fucking in pain and all I think is, _nobody knows about Jack. Make sure nobody will ever know about Jack.”_

Bitty knows how much he needs this. How old these words are and how badly they need to be said.

“But is it fucked up that I wanted to get hit? That I got into so many fights my first year that I got a disciplinary hearing. I got fined. I was 150 pounds and would ask for it. My second year, I was out with a knee injury for two months. I had to get two surgeries and rehab and I was stuck in my apartment just waiting for it to be over. I thought then that I may never be good enough to make Jack happy. He was talking to me, all the time. Telling me what training I needed to do to get back on the ice in shape and how I needed to push myself and I—I just wanted it to end. I kept imagining myself never recovering. I kept wondering where Jack would go if I died too.”

Bitty squeezes Kent’s hand. There are spells and rituals around the transference of mental to physical and back and thinks that Kent’s relationship to pain isn’t all that strange. People who use magic are more attuned to how emotions can precipitate into tangible things, but that doesn’t mean Bitty wants this for him. Doesn’t want him to hurt.

“I allowed myself to talk to him once on the ice. _Once._ It was my first Stanley Cup and we were celebrating and I turned to him and said that I did it for him. Turns out, they caught it on camera. The funny thing is, when the press asked what I was saying later, I told them the truth. That the top prospect in 2009 was my best friend and I won this for him.”

 

* * *

 

Kent’s flight is only delayed a couple hours on the way out, so he still gets up at dawn to grab a taxi to Logan. He smiles for the full flight back, turning the memory of Bitty with sleep-heavy lids kissing him goodbye over and over again in his head.

_He’s mine,_ Kent thinks. _He knows. He wants me. He won’t leave me. I trust him._

He makes it to his practice that night on time and sends each puck into the net like his stick is made of luck. Like his happiness is made of magic. He skates like it isn’t his job for the first time in a long while.

 

“Bro,” Jeff says, stopping Kent as they’re leaving the locker room. “What’s up with you?”

Kent lets his other teammates past, filling his water bottle as a pretense to keep him and Jeff back. “I didn’t realize how much I missed the snow.”

 “Is that right,” Jeff says, crossing his arms. If Kent hadn’t known Jeff Troy for years, he would look a lot scarier. He still has the stitches in on his chin from where he got hit by a high stick last week and his beard is a bit scraggly, but he’s showing his teeth in that way he always does when he’s trying hard not to laugh.

Jeff Troy has known Kent Parson for years and is the closest to anyone who knows the full story, though each slip of knowledge was earned after months by his side. So, maybe Bitty was right because Jeff hasn’t run away yet.

“Come on, man,” Kent says. “Where’re we getting take-out today? I’m fucking starving.”

 

* * *

 

“I was worried you got buried in the snow somewhere,” Lardo says when Bitty finally coaxes his truck back to campus. “If you died, who would pay rent?”

“I’m touched you were so worried,” Bitty says. Lardo’s shouting from somewhere in the living room, but he can’t see her from the door.

“Rans suggested a search party,” Lardo says. “Holster just suggested a party. We made a snow-dick, want to see it?”

“Oh, gosh. Where?”

“Just outside the library,” Lardo says. She meets Bitty in the hall. “You get the best view from the third-floor window.”

“I woulda thought outside the freshman quad would have been a better choice,” Bitty says. Lardo throws her hands up.

“I agree. And yet, the boys outvoted me. Come on, let’s go.”

“Alright, give me a moment.”

Bitty climbs the stairs to deposit the clothes from his backpack in the hamper and air out his shoes. He didn’t think he’d be staying the night in Boston, so he didn’t pack a change of clothes. Kent, though, had lent him a button down when he said he was sure his sweater wouldn’t dry. It still smelled like him—sandalwood and crisp apple. Bitty shrugs it off of himself and lays it out on the bed, slowly and carefully, like he’s performing a ritual.

It’s a lover’s shirt, it could be useful in _something_ , part of his mind is thinking. The other is still lost in the lingering scent.

“Bitty?” Lardo’s voice drifts up from the first floor.

“Coming!”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bitty visits Kent in Vegas. They both realize they've been lying to themselves a little.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I saw my first live Bruins game this week! (They won against the Hurricanes in OT!!)
> 
> Also, you know that saying, "write drunk, edit sober"? Yeah, I did the opposite, so please forgive me.

“Do you care that I’m trying so hard to get rid of you?” Kent asks. Jack is pacing the floor as he sometimes does, halfway to corporal but not quite. He’s interacting with the world in a daze, only blinking dumbly when Kent speaks to him.  

“Do you care if I fall in love with someone else?”

Jack looks past him. Past the jerseys Kent has on his wall—his first all-star appearance, his first year with the C—and past the old photos of teammates from the blues from the Q to the black and white of now.

Kent opens his email, clicking on the confirmation of a flight booking from Boston to Vegas.

“I don’t want you gone,” Kent says as he forwards the tickets to Bitty. “But you’re not really here now, are you? That’s not fair to either of us.”

 

* * *

 

Bitty’s staying with Kent in Vegas for a week over spring break and he’s chirped for days before he leaves.

“Kent fucking Parson?” Holster says. “You’re going to—what kind of magic shit did you pull for this?”

“What are you talking about, man? Nobody can resist our Bitty,” Ransom says.

“He paid for your flight?”

“Is _that_ what you were doing in Montreal?”

_“Who_ he was doing, Rans.”

“Deets!”

“Chill, guys,” Lardo says. “He doesn’t have to say anything if he doesn’t want to, right Bits?”

“Please don’t tell anyone,” Bitty says. “It’s just that—it’s not like that exactly—cus Kent can’t exactly be out when he’s still playing and it—”

“Course, Bitty,” Ransom says. He puts his fingers to his lips. “Won’t say a word.”

“Secrets are more fun anyway,” Holster says. “Oh! Any good pastry recipes with secrets?”

Bitty smirks. “Well, I do have one,” he says. “But they’ve got to be juicy, you see. Ransom, what’s the worst you’ve got on Holster here?”

Ransom grins the widest grin. “I’ve got just the one.”

 

It’s six hours in the air from Boston to Las Vegas. Six hours for Bitty to think again and again that whatever they had was a fluke. A mirage of affection from the blizzard or a temporary lapse of judgment on both their parts.

He spends hours one through three listing ingredients for various tonics and brews he’s working on and how to incorporate them into pies. He falls asleep for hour four. The last two hours, he watches a movie on silent by sneaking a look at his neighbor’s screen. He only understands about half of the plot—it’s one of those Tom Cruise action flicks anyway, so does the plot even matter?

When they land, Bitty still has his stomach looped up in knots and contemplates jumping right back on the plane and begging to be taken back with them.

But when he sees Kent waiting for him by the luggage carousels, hair slicked back under his cap and a sign that reads _Go Yale,_ he melts a little. He rushes to Kent, tugs the sign out of his hands and hugs him.

“If only you’d gotten another shot like that one in the last period, Samwell may have had a chance,” Kent says into his ear.

“You watched that?”

“It was a great play.”

Bitty backs up to take him in. “Hmm, wish I could say the same for you, hun.”

“Cold,” Kent says, still in good spirits. “But I deserve it.”

“I still can’t believe you let the Ducks run you over like—”

“Oh, would you look at that,” Kent says. “The bags from your flight are coming out. Let’s go find your luggage.”

 

* * *

 

Kent wants to take him home immediately. He wants Bitty to himself and to lock them both up for the entire week. He can scratch all his games. He can order food to the door. He can send Kit out into the world to pretend to be him at pressers and screen all his calls.

He won’t. But he can let himself imagine it.

Bitty says he dreams of food from chefs with their own TV shows and Kent can’t say no. So, Kent calls and begs for a table at a restaurant that has been booked solid for the last month. Bitty’s eyes light up under the lights and they try very hard not to touch too much under the table.

“There’s food magic here, you know,” Bitty says, looking around.

“Isn’t that what you do?”

“No, no, see I use food as a medium for spells and brews,” he says. He’s talking with his hands, words fast and eager. “But that’s up to the individual. Some people use dance or words or touch, but the end goal is the same. The medium isn’t the end goal.”

“But the food here is?” Kent says.

“Yes! All the magic is used to make the food _taste_ good. It takes different training to be able to do that.” 

Bitty orders veal and hums into his fork when he takes the first bite. He looks like he’s deconstructing it in his mind—he sniffs the greens and puts a little in his mouth before tasting the sauce alone.

Kent cuts into his steak and when it touches his tongue—yes, it is probably one of the best single bites he’s had. It melts in his mouth and it explodes with flavor. But still, it feels almost flat as it is. Just a good steak, very indulgent, but nothing more.

“I still like your food best,” Kent says.

Bitty goes a little red and ducks his head. “You’re just tryin’ to be sweet.”

“I like that the magic has a purpose,” Kent says. “It makes it taste more real.”

The lights make shadows dance across Bitty’s arm as he drops his fork to squeeze Kent’s hand. It’s just a short touch, light and quick and thankful. It takes effort for Kent not to pull him back. All Kent wants to do is feel Bitty’s skin. Remind himself that Bitty is here, is a real person. Is solid and whole and can hear him when he speaks. Is part of his world—here, now—because he chooses to be.

 

* * *

 

Before Bitty left for college, there were many people in his family trying to convince him to stay. Stay in Georgia, where his home has always been. Stay with family, who love him and will protect him. Stay where is magic is strongest, where he learned and will learn and will teach his future children.

“I understand your reasons for going north,” Grandma Phelps had said one night when they got a chance to speak alone. “But you could find an apprenticeship if you wanted. Why college?”

“You know I love my magic,” Bitty says. “But I—I just don’t want it to be the only reason people love me. I want friends who don’t see me as a witch before anything else.” _I want to find someone to love who doesn’t care. About any of it._

His grandmother took Bitty’s cheek in her hand, old callouses smooth and hard under his eyes. She didn’t have to say anything. Bitty knew she understood. Bitty knew she would let him go.

 

Bitty kisses Kent as soon as they get into the car. As soon as the lights from the strip fade and they are sure they are alone. He knots his hands in Kent’s shirt and traces his hand across his chest and _Lord,_ he isn’t sure how he’s going to make it to the house without causing Kent to drive off the road.

“Bits…” Kent breathes. He digs his teeth into Bitty’s neck and he may just come there.

“We’ve got to—” Bitty says. Inhales. “House—”

When Kent pulls back, all Bitty can see is how pink and wet his lips are. _Lord help me._

“It’s um—it’s a twenty-minute drive,” Kent says. It looks like he needs to work to find the words. “Music?”

Bitty’s hands shake a bit as he turns up the radio. “Let’s go.”

 

Looking back, Bitty should have noticed something was off when he set foot in Kent’s car. The pull of magic isn’t one that he usually misses, but granted, he was distracted.

When they pull into Kent’s driveway, Bitty smells the after effects of old spells. Sees the dull, charcoal streaks of magic that must have been hovering nearby for some time. Maybe there’s a magic user neighbor, the back of Bitty’s mind supplies. Or, maybe the last owner of the house had infused magic into the walls.

The thing is, Bitty isn’t thinking very hard. Kent parks and his hand is on Bitty’s and they kiss their way up the walkway until they burst into the house. Kent presses Bitty against the wall and his head goes empty except for _yes_ and _more_ and _god._

So, in the end, it’s Kit that finally gets Bitty to stop. The cat rubs against their legs and mews at them both until Kent gives in and picks her up.

“Say hi properly, Kit, you lil’ cockblocker,” Kent says.

And Bitty’s eyes go wide.

“She’s—how did you,” Bitty sputters. “Kent, Kit’s a familiar.”

“Kit’s a what?”

Bitty looks around. They’re in what looks like a living room, but the floor plan is open so he can see the kitchen beyond a dining table and _everything_ is touched by magic. It’s not just the watch with a little luck or the jars Bitty can see lined up on the counter from the brews he’d sent Kent over the last couple months. It’s in the books and reflected off the photos on the walls and growing in the plants on the windowsills. The little red threads connecting Kent to Jack that Bitty’s long learned to ignore are pulling on Kent from all directions. They lead from his fingertips to the computer open on the coffee table and from the nape of his neck to a ragged jacket hung up on a coat rack by the door.

While Kit glowed with colors of her own—soft purple hues that smell of dew-laden flowers—she is also tied to Kent with his red threads.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Bitty says.

“Tell you—I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You didn’t _tell me!”_ Bitty says, louder. Angrier. How could he? After all that time Bitty spent trying to unravel Kent’s connection to Jack. After he opened himself up to him, trusted him. He was just there, with that power—

“Please,” Kent says. “I don’t understand. Why are you upset? Kit can be an asshole sometimes, but she’s really a good cat, and—”

“Kit’s not a—she’s magical, Kent. You must have known. How old is she?”

“Um…” Kent looks at her. “I don’t know. I got her as a stray. Magical?”

Why isn’t Kent explaining? Bitty’s been traipsing around like an idiot and Kent’s still acting like he doesn’t know. Just like when he lied about who Jack was—anyone who looked carefully enough could see. There are so many lights and so many smells around him. All the magic is giving him a headache.

Bitty shakes his head. “Did you really want my help at all?” he says. He can feel his eyes start to water. Damn. “Or was I just entertainment to you?”

“That’s not—” Kent says. He reaches out to Bitty, but he backs away. “I’m not—please, tell me what I did wrong.”

“You’re an _anchor,”_ Bitty spits.

“I’m a…?”

“A magnet for magic, a fulcrum, a black hole that just pulls anything with even a little power into it. I don’t know what _you_ call it.”

Kent stares at him, blank-faced.

“Somebody must have told you,” Bitty says.

“No,” Kent says. “You can see that I’m—pulling things?”

Bitty doesn’t know what to say to him, so he digs through his suitcase and finds a jar of stardust he brought from home. One of the ones they caught together. Now, he knows why they were so successful. Kent watches him carefully as Bitty unscrews the cap and digs his fist inside.

The thing about stardust is though it is made of wishes, it needs particulars to activate. It needs kids whispering about snow days and crushes under their breaths to take hold. Bitty needs a wish, but the only thing he can come up with is for the pain in his chest to go away. 

Kent frowns. “Isn’t that the…?”

Bitty blows hard on the dust and sends it flying. It’s red and yellow and gold. It shines in the light and hangs in the air for a second before doing exactly what he expected it to do. It rushes into an orbit around Kent, filling the space around him like a cloud.

If this were any other time, Bitty would let himself think about how beautiful it is. How the stars make Kent look like something from another world. His eyes change color as the dust around him does, shifting as Kent pulls his fingers through the air, jaw open in awe.

_“I’m_ doing this?”

“You are an anchor for magic,” Bitty says with ice in his voice he can’t dislodge.

Each time Kent moves, the threads pull and shift with him. He’s the center of everything in this house and he can’t see it.

“You’re still angry,” Kent says.

Bitty closes his eyes. “It’s _you_ , Kent. Magic doesn’t just happen. It’s you.”

When he opens his eyes again, Kent’s gone pale. He looks toward Jack and the red cords that lead to him tighten. Jack looks back.

“Jack, hun,” Bitty says. “When you died, Kent found you, didn’t he?”

Jack nods, once.

“No,” Kent says, voice straining.

“Jack,” Bitty says. “It wasn’t you who wanted to stay, was it?”

Jack flickers. He’s on the floor again with crumpled limbs and eyes open, facing the sky. His breath comes slowly, almost gently. His lips are blue and he goes still. He flickers again and he’s standing once more.

“Something pulled me back,” Jack says.

Kent makes a sound—a tight-lipped whine that escapes through his throat.

“Some _one,”_ Bitty says.

“No,” Kent gasps. He sinks to the floor. “No, I didn’t want this. I couldn’t have wanted this.” Around him, threads are snapping and weaving back together.

Bitty is afraid to look down. He’s afraid to look at his own skin and see red there too because it means he never escaped a world where is magic meant more than his mind. That his worth would always be tied to what he could be for others. It was so shallow of him to hope that Kent saw him for more.

“There’s nothing I can do for you,” Bitty says. “Jack’s still here because you want him here. No amount of stardust will change that.”

Kent looks up, eyes red and face flushed. A sob rattles his chest. “Don’t go. Please, don’t go.”

Bitty watches the threads weave from Kent’s heart to his and he feels the tug when they land. When he finally lets himself look, there are already others there, tied deep. That pain in his chest, that hurt he feels looking back at Kent, it’s all just the magic. It’s just the manipulation of an anchor who doesn’t know his power. Bitty can’t stand to be in this place any longer.

He turns on his heel, gathers his luggage, and steps out the door.

 

* * *

 

A door slamming shut is the loneliest sound in the world. A thud. An echo. Steps walking away.

When he was sixteen and more eager for Jack’s attention than scared of the consequences, he’d kissed him in an empty locker room after practice. They both smelled like sweat, but the whole locker room smelled of teenage BO so really they just smelled like the world they both inhabited. Kent pulled on Jack’s shirt and found his lips.

Jack pushed him away. Shoved him hard enough that his back hit the wall because Jack was more scared than in love. He ran away from Kent that day, slamming the door behind him so Kent was left alone, struggling to breathe.

“I’m sorry,” Kent says. He can hardly look at the ghost that was once his best friend. Was once his lover. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”

“You knew,” Jack says. “On some level.”

Kent buries his head in his arms and runs his nails along the back of his neck. “I thought I’d be able to let you go.”

“We made promises together, didn’t we, Kenny?”

Late nights in Jack’s room with the TV turned on low so his parents wouldn’t overhear, they spun stories of the NHL legends they would become.

When Kent lifts his head, Jack is sitting on the couch, knees crossed and head leaned back like he used to do on long bus rides. “There are some things left to do,” Jack says. “Lead the league in goals, get your name in the hall of fame. If you stay with the Aces they’ll have to retire your number.”

“I can’t stay.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Jack says. “The Aces still want you. It’s what’s best.”

“I’m not—that’s not why you’re still here,” Kent says. “It’s my fucking fault, but it was us, together.”

“It was always hockey with us, Kenny.”

Lingering pats on the back. _Good game, man._ Blowjobs in locked hotel rooms after curfew. Knocking helmets and hoping nobody would see how close Kent really wanted to be.

Then, Kent thinks of Bitty. Of warm touches on cold nights. Skype calls picked up after the first ring. The scent of almonds and cinnamon and _Lord, what will I do with you?_ Giving his whole heart even though he’s terrified it’ll turn out the same as the last time he fell in love.

“No, no it wasn’t,” Kent says. “We never wanted the same thing, did we?”

“We did,” Jack says. “You just have to do it _for_ me.”

Again, Kent’s reminded of how young Jack still is. When they were growing up, everyone teased Jack for being an old soul. Coaches said it because he was always so serious, but Kent knew it was actually because he looked at the everything like he was already world-weary. Old soul or not, he only ever had eighteen years to live. He still had the experience of a teenager, the desires of a teenager, while Kent had time to grow up.

Kent had years to understand what he wanted and what he never got a chance to have.

“I need to find Bitty,” Kent says.

“He said you don’t need him.”

“He doesn’t know what I need,” Kent says as he pulls out his phone. _“You_ don’t know what I need either.”

Kent types out _I’m sorry. Please come back._

“He doesn’t want you,” Jack says. “Why is he any different than your friends who only come by when they get something out of it?”

“Stop,” Kent says. “Bitty’s not—he wouldn’t.”

His phone doesn’t buzz. Bitty doesn’t text him back. Kent taps out, _I’ll pick you up if you need a ride. Please. I want to fix whatever I did._

“Why do you care?” Jack says. “I don’t get it. You worked so hard for this sport and you’re finally becoming who you want to be. This is just a distraction.”

_I want you to be ok,_ Kent types. _I want us to be ok._

His phone stays silent.

Kent closes his eyes and digs his nails into his forearm, his mind working through injuries he’s had on the ice. Hard hits that knocked the wind out of his lungs and left him gasping for minutes, sure he’d suffocate. Blades that ran across his arm where his jersey rode up. Sticks to the wrists that left bruises for a week. A puck to the neck. His knee, torn and replaced and sewn back together. More surgeries on his shoulder and his ankle. He feels each one, memories sweet as falling drops of blood and he wants so desperately to be in pain for a reason. Something he can point to and say, “I’m hurt, see? I’m hurt. Please, don’t make me go on.”

 

* * *

 

Bitty checks into the first hotel he finds that he can afford and spends the night counting the reasons he’s staying away from Kent.

  1. Anchors are dangerous. Even if they can’t weave magic themselves, they can bend others to do their bidding. He grew up on stories of unsuspecting magic users becoming entrapped by the seductions of an anchor and those stories always ended in tragedy.
  2. Bitty’s attraction to Kent is just a side-effect of the magic. A way to pull Bitty into his orbit and never let go. It will slowly constrict around him and starve him. Pull nutrients from his veins like strangler vines from their hosts.
  3. Kent’s attraction to Bitty is a shallow thing. A crow with shiny objects, just one more in a collection.
  4. Jack is a warning of what could happen if Kent’s magic wove deep enough into his heart.
  5. ~~He’s not ready.~~
  6. Bitty is looking for love, not infatuation, and with this, he’ll never be able to tell the difference.
  7. He’s afraid of ~~being in love.~~ ~~what will happen.~~ not being in control.



 

“Grandma,” Bitty whispers into his phone the next morning. He’s hardly slept. “Grandma, I don’t know what to do.”

“I can’t tell you how to move forward,” she says. “That’s your decision alone. But remember what I always told you, if you don’t want your magic to be the first thing people see of you, you can’t let magic be the only way you see others.”

Bitty wants to tell her that it’s hard. He can’t turn it off, this Sight. He watches undercurrents flow behind others actions and he feels the magic when it’s in the air. He wants so badly to forget that Kent has the ability to yank at those cords like he’s a puppet master, but then Bitty thinks of what could happen if he left his heart open for him. He’s so vulnerable. If he wished, Kent could tear him apart.

“I wanted it to be easy,” Bitty says. “It felt so easy, to—to fall—”

“Oh, honey, it’s never easy,” she says. “You don’t need magic to break someone’s heart.”

 

Bitty orders room service and watches the city tick on like clockwork from the window.

 

That night, Bitty turns on the TV, just to let the hotel room soak in the sound and feel just a little less empty. He doesn’t expect a sports channel to be on. Or, for the Aces game to be the first thing that pops up on the screen. The white expanse of a rink meets him and his heart skips a beat.

His grandmother would say something like, _luck isn’t just a thing to be stumbled upon. Sometimes it’s patient and attentive and appears at the right moments._

Sometimes, Bitty would rather not have luck stalking him like a lost dog. He goes to switch the channel, but then he hears the announcers talking.

“A healthy scratch from Aces captain Kent Parson tonight. Do we know why?”

“No word from the Vegas management on that, but they’ve rearranged their first line to include…”

There are images of a rookie on the screen. Stats and draft number and the announcers are still talking but Bitty doesn’t hear them anymore. Scratch?

Bitty scrolls through the texts he ignored over the past day—ten unread that took all his will not to touch. _At least tell me you’re safe,_ one says. _Please._

_The last time a friend disappeared after we fought, I found him too late._

_Don’t make me do that again._

Bitty wouldn’t—he hadn’t even thought that was where Kent’s mind would take him. His hand trembles.

Kent told him over late night skype calls that it had never been only Jack that drank too much those years. It hadn’t been only him who hid behind pills to get through each day. They’d shared everything, not just their hopes. Their histories were tied in ways that made them both unable to let go.

Bitty doesn’t know what to do. _I’m okay,_ he sends back, but it doesn’t feel like enough.

He gets nothing back.

 

Lardo once asked Bitty how a southern kid found sports on ice to be his calling. She was hanging out by the boards during practice, dangling her legs off the bench. It was one of the few times Bitty found a free hour on the ice when nobody had it booked and he’d brought out his figure skates to remember how it felt to dance.

Bitty said it was something about how he felt on skates and how his sight led him there.

“So it was the magic?” Lardo said.

“No,” Bitty said. “The magic just knew me.”

There was no good way to explain it. No few words that could tell her which steps he’d taken in his life that had led him to putting on skates. No magic that could explain all of what he felt.

 

Magic alone can’t explain why Bitty goes back to Kent. No twisted threads could engineer worry in his breast like he feels. No number of wishes on stardust could make it go away.

 

* * *

 

If Kent turns off the lights and sits on the floor of his bedroom, he can’t see Jack die for the fifth time that night. If he puts on his headphones and blasts Britney Spears until his ears ring, he can’t hear his phone buzz. He doesn’t have to say why he’s not at the game. Why he’s letting his team down when they need him because he’s selfish and can’t pull himself together.

The sink in the bathroom is still running. A glass slipped from his grip and shattered across the floor and he doesn’t want to cross the shards to turn off the flow of water.

He left his keys in the car when halfway through the day, he decided he would try to go out to find Bitty, but realized he had no idea where to start driving.

Kit has curled up beside him, knocking her head into his side and climbing up on his lap. If he pets her just how she likes it, she’ll start to purr. If she stays, then he won’t have failed everyone that trusts him.

Suddenly, the light switches on and Kent rips the headphones from his ears, his heart beating fast.

Bitty’s there, arms braced around himself like it’s all that’s holding him up.

Kent reaches out—wants to hug Bitty close and inhale that cinnamon scent from his hair—but he stops himself. His arms hang halfway, positioned like a broken prayer.

“I was worried you’d—” Kent’s throat feels closed up and raw. Jack is lying still in the corner somewhere beyond his vision. “I kept thinking of—”

But Bitty doesn’t look at Jack. He keeps his eyes on Kent and only Kent. From her perch on his knee, Kit hisses at Bitty.

Bitty cocks his head to the side.

“She must have once belonged to a Healer,” Bitty says. He inspects Kit from afar with those puzzle-solving eyes. “You didn’t force her to you—your magic I mean—or, well—” Bitty stops. Starts again. “Familiars are guides who choose their masters. Kit is learned in healing, and she’s chosen you.”

“What are you saying?” Kent says.

“That I was wrong,” Bitty says. “That just because you’re an anchor doesn’t mean I can’t choose you too.”

“I’m sorry I—I made you uncomfortable. I’m doing something—tell me how to control it so I—”

“Oh, sweetheart, I’m the one who should be sorry,” Bitty says. He crosses the room and sits cross-legged in front of Kent. Kit has stopped hissing, but is regarding Bitty with a side-eye only cats are capable of. “I didn’t listen to you. You were trying to tell me for months how you thought this magic worked and I didn’t want to believe I could be wrong.”

 

* * *

 

Bitty hears the sound of Kent’s red cords threading around him. They’re tumultuous things, knotting and snapping, but the ones that settle around Bitty are careful. Deliberate. They whisper over his hands, move up his arms, warm his stomach, and settle in his ribcage. Bitty’s first reaction is to flinch back. To run away again so he doesn’t have to know what it feels like to be bound to someone else. But he stays and watches them form, knowing that even if he couldn’t see them—even if Kent weren’t an anchor—some sort of magic would still bring them together.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bitty watches the playoffs on his TV knowing that Kent has made a decision, they both remember what it's like to love to skate, and Jack...?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter that earned the rating so get ready for some emotional sexy times ;) 
> 
> And if anyone is interested, I listened to George Ogilvie's Foreign Hands and P!nk's What About Us on repeat while writing this. So, you know, ~mood~
> 
> (Also, make a wild guess as to which NHL team I cheer for. Not that it doesn't also make complete sense location-wise, but still)

Kent gets Bitty a seat at the Aces game against the Kings the next day.

He wants Bitty to see that he doesn’t need Jack to win. That he doesn’t need that constant voice of his dead friend telling him what he should do—what they were _meant_ to do together—to be whole on the ice. Yes, he knows now that his power pulls Jack in and gives him skates and lets him live again, just for a few minutes. But this power of his isn’t letting either of them move on.

In the first period, the Kings get an early goal and then one more during a power play and the Aces are trailing two behind only ten minutes into the game. The home crowd is yelling and their coach looks like he wants to punch one of the refs, but Kent likes playing from a deficit. He likes chasing because when he’s ahead, it feels like everyone is just waiting for him to fail. But when he’s behind, he can take risks. He can be himself.

After the next line change, Kent barrels onto the ice. The puck is loose and skidding toward a King’s defenseman, but Kent always had his speed.

Jack knows this. Jack always took advantage of that fact when they were in the Q when their plays together always took advantage of how fast Kent could skate and how accurately Jack could shoot. It’s easy to fall into old habits when Jack is still whispering in his ear, still pointing to the corner and saying, _go!_ But Kent has years of professional playing in his muscles he hadn’t had when he was a teen. He has a more trained eye and different teammates. Kent has become a different player.

Instead of following Jack’s lead, Kent spins to the left of the net. He sees a defenseman cutting him off from the side from the edge of his vision, but he keeps his head down and the puck in his control. It isn’t just him and a ghost on the ice. It’s Jeff just at his heels and Scraps at the other end and its suddenly three on two and Kent has a window to the top shelf. He’d never been able to make that shot in the juniors—he wouldn’t have even attempted it. He would have passed to Jack because that’s what they did and that was what Jack wanted. A quick one-timer that _may_ have gone in if Jack could avoid the check. This moment, though, his teammates were keeping the Kings players off of him and Kent had one moment to shoot.

The light goes on and the horn blares.

_I’m not who Jack couldn’t be,_ Kent says to himself. _I am no ghost._

 

The ice is freedom. It’s the crowd shouting when he gets to the goal and a celly at the bench. The ice is also cold, made of pinpricks and harsh wind when he turns his back on Jack again.

By the third period, when the game is tied 3-3, Jack fades.

When overtime starts, Jack is gone completely, and Kent is truly alone.

His heart is beating fast and his breath is coming out in gasps. When he bends low into a turn, he can feel his legs shake. They burn as he cuts across the circle and he wills himself to go faster, cleaner. There are only two minutes left and he won’t let it go to a shootout.

Kent takes the puck behind the net and gets a check to the shoulder. He’s off his feet for a moment, into the boards and onto the ice, but he reaches his arm out and gets his stick to the puck before the Kings player. He taps it to Jeff and scrabbles up, every muscle in his body aching.

Jeff shoots, it bounces off the pads of the goalie. Kent gets the rebound, scoops it to the side, and into the net.

The cheering swells and Kent laughs.

 

* * *

 

The light shines off of Kent’s visor when he throws his head back in celebration and Bitty sees love on the ice again. Except, this time, it’s a steadier sort of love. One that fills Kent’s frame with life instead of need.

It’s the first time Bitty sees Kent truly love himself.

 

Bitty follows Kent to a bar after their win. The waves of yelling and cheers of sports fans are replaced by the music and buzz of conversation in Bitty’s first experience of Vegas nightlife. The team must be regulars because the bouncer at the door nods them in and the other patrons mingling around hardly bat an eye at the recognizable faces.

“We can go,” Kent says into his ear. “I know this probably wasn’t what you were expecting to do today.”

“Hun, no,” Bitty says. The lights are dim and the music is reasonably close to the pump-up playlist he has synced onto his phone. The smell, though, is quite a bit less horrid than the college dive bars near Samwell. “You seem to forget that going to bars with a bunch of hockey jocks is something I do.”

Kent smiles and it’s still the lingering joy of his win on the ice. Bitty doesn’t want to see it go. “Drink, then?”

“Whatever you’re having.”

Kent raises his eyebrows. “I’m getting the cheapest beer they have on tap.”

“Lord, you have all that money and still…? No. Get me something with tequila and an umbrella. _Especially_ if you have to pay more for the umbrella.”

“The umbrella isn’t going to make it taste better.”

“No, but the knowledge that you’re spending your vast wealth on tiki drinks will.”

“You’re dangerous.” Kent squeezes his arm before shouldering his way to the bar.

It’s different, watching him with his team. They catch his eye and chirp him with teeth flashing or pat him on the back and bring him in close. He’s their captain, Bitty has to remind himself. A captain for many years. “Parser, man. Tell Wiley here that he can’t just call this girl and—” “Shut up, I know what I’m doing.” “Last time you took—” “We don’t talk about that.” “I remember something about a missed date and a call to your mother.” “Fuck you, Parser.”

Someone breaks off from the crowd and finds a spot at Bitty’s side.

“Jeff,” he says, hand out. “Jeff Tr—”

“Troy, yeah,” Bitty says, shaking his hand. “I know. Good game.”

“You’re Kent’s friend.”

Bitty notices how he doesn’t call him Parser. He also notices how firm his grip is and it lingers after Bitty lets go.

“You don’t seem happy about that.”

Jeff leans against the wall and Bitty is glad that he never has to face someone like him on the ice. He’s thinking, looking Bitty over like he’s hunting for weaknesses—a place to drive a knife, or a well-aimed elbow. “Kent needs friends.”

“So why does it feel like you’re trying to dissuade me?” Bitty says.

“Kent _needs_ friends,” Jeff says. “Not like anyone else I’ve ever met does. He’s good at hiding it though. The bastard never learned how to use his words.”

“He’s learning.”

“Been learning,” Jeff says. “You should have seen him his rookie year. Look liked he was going to piss himself each time anyone got close enough to say hi. When he was out on the ice, though, he was someone else.”

Bitty nods, he understands. “Like he could communicate with you guys.”

“Yeah,” Jeff says. He looks at Bitty with hard eyes. “It was like magic.”

There must be a reason Kent chose Jeff to be his friend—his keeper and confidante on a team that is currently roasting each other for bygone conquests. There’s whoops and cheers behind him and Jeff ignores the din.

He wonders how much he knows about Kent because he was the only one he could talk to, and how much he guessed, simply being close.

“I’m glad Kent has you,” Bitty says.

“Took me until the playoffs that first year to be anything to for him,” Jeff says. “He was the kid everyone talked about, you know? He was the angel of the press and the pet project of the coaches. I didn’t think he’d be drinking himself to sleep every night.”

“He wouldn’t want—”

“I know it’s nothing he hasn’t told you,” Jeff says. “He needs to get out of this city. Out of this fucking place that still can’t see him as anything but that kid who needs to be perfect.”

 Bitty watches Kent making his way back, holding his shoulders high as Scraps and Wiley tap their drinks against his.

“Would it change anything?” Bitty asks.

“I think it will.”

“Jeff!” Kent says, face bright. “You two gossiping?”

“Course we are, hun,” Bitty says. “Now did you—oh! _Two_ umbrellas.”

“I bribed the bartender.”

Bitty takes a sip. “That’s the spirit.”

There’s an easy space between Kent and Jeff as they talk—a humming familiarity that swells as they jump from subject to subject. Jeff tells him about the time Kent cried at a Britney concert, but before Kent can blush, Bitty says that he’s cried at pictures of Beyoncé, so he can’t be one to judge. The length of the night and the strength of the alcohol catch up to him and they’re all laughing before he can figure out why.

There’s a shift in the music. One of the guys calls Jeff back over.

“Swoops, you in or what?”

Jeff sighs. “Never make a bet with Freddy,” he says to Bitty. “You’ll never hear the end of it.

“Swoops!”

Jeff waves and lumbers off. Kent chuckles into his drink, still almost full to the neck.

“You don’t look like you’re enjoying that beer,” Bitty says.

“That’s the trick. If it’s bad enough, I won’t get another and I’ll still be able to drive home.”

Bitty’s already a little past tipsy and being able to drive seems like a bad trade with this feeling he has right now, slotted against Kent’s side, smiley and riding the music. “What good is driving?”

They’re in a dark enough corner, surrounded by the backs of players and where nobody is watching. Kent puts a finger to Bitty’s jawline and says, “getting home.”

And, oh, yes. That. His fingers looped around Kent’s hip grow needier, digging through his shirt to skin and he suddenly feels very hot. The lights and bass mix around them and Bitty feels like he’s floating. He’s swimming through molten glass—burning and warping the world.

“I watched an interview,” Bitty says. “One that asked about your future with the Aces.”

“What about it?”

“What you said, about not speaking for others,” Bitty says. “They thought you were talking about the other GMs, but you were talking about Jack, weren’t you?”

“I _was_ talking about the GMs,” Kent says. Then, sighs. “But yes, that too.”

“You were different out there today.”

“I was trying to be,” Kent says.

“You deserve to be around people who let you make your own decisions,” Bitty says. The music shifts and it’s smooth as water down his throat and it’s so easy for Bitty to keep talking. “Jeff seems to think I’ve been unfair to you.

“Jeff doesn’t know—”

“He does,” Bitty says. “Dance with me.”

“What?”

“I can see you want to.” Bitty can feel Kent’s hips swaying and stuttering like he’s trying so hard to keep them still. “We don’t have to go out there. Here, nobody’s watching. It’s just us.”

Bitty takes Kent’s hands and twists his hips until he can feel Kent’s bones relaxing one by one—his shoulders, his vertebrae one by one, his wrists, his neck turned elegant and long.

“Any team would be lucky to have you.”

“Any team would have to pay a lot for me,” Kent says.

Bitty giggles, tugging on Kent’s arm, and lets himself _move._ Kent follows. It’s like their sing-a-longs on car rides and discussions of concerts they’d love to go to. It’s everything they wish they could be if nobody was judging them. Kent dances with Bitty and he’s beautiful. “Think about all the tiki drinks you’d have to buy me.”

“I’d buy a whole tiki bar,” Kent breathes. “Torches and fake wood and everything.”

“How romantic,” Bitty says. He tugs on Kent’s collar and kisses him. They’re both sweaty and it’s too dark to aim properly so they catch the edges of each other’s lips. Bitty catches the roughness of Kent’s stubble on his tongue. When the bass rumbles and the beat drops, Kent presses his forehead to Bitty’s.

“I’m scared I’ll screw this up,” Kent says.

“You haven’t yet.”

“Let’s get out of here.”  

 

Kent’s kisses are greedy, possessive things. They wrap Bitty up in nipping teeth and short, inhaled breaths. When Bitty tugs himself forward, eager to regain some control over their mess of skin and touch and desperate limbs, Kent hums and plants a peck onto the crown of Bitty’s head and suddenly, he doesn’t care at all. Bitty can ease like warm clay into Kent’s hands and curve his spine to grind their hips together.

“Honey,” Bitty says wanting more of Kent’s feather touches and sharp attention. He gives everything—ties up his hopes and dreams into other people even when there’s no magic to keep them down. But Bitty is choosing this, is letting himself be taken up and worshipped by this man who loves so intensely he’d raised the dead.

Kent’s home is still overwhelming, but not oppressive like Bitty thought when he was here the first time. It’s _him,_ but brighter and with lingering energy in everything he touches. Kent presses them onto the couch and Bitty feels joy and laughter, like the soundtrack to a rom-com on in the background. He blinks and he sees an old novel open by the side table, edges worn down by many hands, memories within the words. Bitty can’t help but wish to be in this world with him—to be enveloped by his arms and become something treasured.

“Bitty,” Kent says and it comes out rough. He paws at the buttons of Bitty’s shirt as if he can will them free. Or, like he’s trying his hardest not to rip them off. His muscles tense and Bitty thinks, of all things, Kent’s first slap shot that night, and wonder if he could. Shivers for thinking about it. “Fuck—I want—”

He decides it’s best to keep his shirt intact, but only unbuttons it enough to pull it off over his head. Bitty slides forward into Kent’s lap and lets him explore his bare stomach and chest while Bitty unbuckles Kent’s belt. The slide of metal over leather makes his heart bound, but Kent’s tongue along his collarbone makes him whimper and forget how to move his fingers properly.

“Off,” Bitty says.

Kent chuckles low and vibrating, like the purring of a cat. “Be more specific.”

“Everything,” Bitty says. He makes desperate motions to Kent’s shirt and pants, snaking his hands under the hems to find warmth. He yelps as Kent cups his hands beneath Bitty’s ass, rocking him forward and _god_ he wants to be closer. He wants the heat of his mouth and his hands and there are just too many layers of clothes between them. Bitty can feel the cold metal of Kent’s belt riding against his stomach and the fierce pressure of Kent’s nails against his jeans, but it isn’t enough.

Bitty pulls at Kent’s pants. He struggles with the angle before kicking off of the couch to kneel in front of him and undoing the zipper and hooking his fingers around the belt loops. Kent’s breath comes out in a groan above him and Bitty feels the length of his fingers dig into his scalp. As Bitty gets each of Kent’s legs free, Kent’s hands roam through his hair and down to his neck and shoulders. The heat built at every pass of skin on skin, his touch like ember and light.

Meanwhile, Bitty worked his mouth over Kent’s knees and up his thighs. He saw scars there from old surgeries—harsh, puckered lines too straight to look right—and newer bruises dappled blue and purple. He kissed them with wet lips as he inched higher, relishing the catch in Kent’s breath as Bitty bit the edge of his black boxers and plunges his hands into Kent’s waistband to free his cock.

“Is this…?” Kent says, palm hovering by Bitty’s cheek. “Fuck, you don’t have to—”

“Bless your heart,” Bitty says and wraps his lips over Kent’s dick.

“Fuck. Bitty, I—ah—”

Bitty lets his tongue run down Kent's length and grips the base of the shaft with his fist. When Kent hisses and knots his fingers in Bitty’s hair, he takes it deeper, swallowing until he can feel his throat closing up.

Bitty never thought he liked this. With any of the partners he’s had in college, he never volunteered to suck them off. When one of his winter screw dates asked him to, he did because he didn’t know how to say no. He had only thought it was demeaning. Something nobody could ever _enjoy,_ only agree to in a trade that would eventually end up in bed.

This though? This is something else. He wants to get closer—to run his tongue up Kent’s cock until he squirms and begs for more. It isn’t debasing to do this for him because he can feel his own pants straining under the weight of his growing need.

“Tease,” Kent says. He’s breathing heavily. “That’s just a fucking—god, Bitty.”

Bitty hums into Kent’s skin and releases the tip of his cock with a wet _pop._ He tries on his most innocent face. “Yes? A fucking what?”

“Menace,” Kent says. “A fucking—I’m going to come if you keep doing that.”

Bitty leans forward and pulls at Kent’s shirt, rolling the bottom up over his navel and Kent lifts his arms to shrug the rest of it off.

“That _is_ the point,” Bitty says.

“Not yet,” Kent says. “Not until I have you—bed. Now, bed.”

Bitty pouts, still focused on the scent of sweat and the slick feeling of Kent’s dick on his lips. It’s intoxicating, this slipstream reality he’s living through. The pink that’s running from Kent’s chest to his neck and the groan that rumbles from his belly. It’s _him_ that’s doing that—Bitty. He could drown in the river of that power rushing through him.

But before he can protest, Kent stands and reaches around Bitty’s waist to hoist him up, carrying him through the open bedroom door. Bitty squeals, but the surprise leaves him quickly as he grabs Kent’s arm to steady himself. And, _oh._ Again, he thinks of Kent on the ice—in command and so at ease and so competent. Strong and swift and…then, Bitty can’t help but imagine him out there, as naked like he is now—like he was for that Sports Illustrated body issue except his. Entirely his.

Kent throws Bitty onto the sheets and when he follows him down, Kent is trembling. He’s looming over him with arms on either side of his shoulders, knee somewhere between his legs but not quite close enough, and simply staring at him. Watching, like the world has narrowed to the slip of space between them and he’s surprised he’s still there.

Lord, help him.

Bitty wraps his legs around Kent’s waist and inches him closer. 

 

* * *

 

With Jack, intimacy was something that could only be described as carnal. It was contests of strength as they pressed each other against the wall of Jack’s basement when his parents were out of town—swift bites and short tugs. They always fucked like they were about to be caught— five-minute bursts and clothes half-on, even if they had two days to themselves with nobody around. The wind would be knocked out of Kent as Jack curled his fingers around the back of his neck and shoved him onto the bed, ripping his jeans to his knees and slicking one finger, then two, before entering him whole. And then, Kent had loved it, because _that_ was what it was like to be close to someone. To give himself up to them and let Jack take and take and take. It didn’t matter that sometimes there was anger or fear mixed up in the sex because it was all of what they were. If they couldn’t be real in bed—if they couldn’t let their feelings loose there—then they were nothing.

But here, with Bitty, he can’t think of it that way. He presses his forehead against his, and then slow and deliberate, removes Bitty’s pants and then his underwear until there is nothing but the two of them. They can revel in the full feeling of what he was so sure he could never have.

He reaches down and palms them both, hot and slick with precome, and looks into Bitty’s eyes and finds no shame. There is nothing there but pleasure and want and a look that Kent’s mind is too muddled to unpack—something that makes Kent want to bury his face against his neck when Bitty’s lids flutter. Something that makes Kent want to hide.

Bitty must feel his hesitation.

“Kent, honey,” Bitty says, wrapping a leg around his and running his heel along Kent’s calf. “Kenny.”

Kent moans. Bitty can’t know what that name will do to him.

“Kenny,” Bitty tries again. “You need to tell me what you want.”

“I just—fuck,” Kent says. He shivers, pressing his hips to Bitty’s and relishing in the friction. He wants what he can’t have because he’s always been too afraid to ask. He always said _yes_ with Jack, not _I want._ Like he was always meant to have been grateful—and yes, he was. “Bitty, I—I don’t—”

Bitty kisses him and guides his mind back to the two of them—his bedroom, the dim lights, the shut curtains and half-open door. He coaxes his tongue out and when he takes a breath, he keeps close to Kent’s lips, warmth passing between them. “You gotta learn to say it, Kenny. I’ll never tell you that you’re wrong for wantin’.”

“You,” Kent says. “I want—fuck, I want to fuck you, Bitty.”

“Good,” Bitty says and grins a wicked sort of grin. He pulls Kent closer and nibbles at his ear. “That’s what I want, too.”

Kent reaches for the bedside table, knocking the alarm clock over in an effort to get the drawer open and the lube and condoms out. He slicks his fingers and Bitty murmurs encouragements as tentatively at first, then with more and more insistence, Kent fingers Bitty’s ass. He doesn’t need to touch himself as he does because every time Bitty sighs or keens or whispers, “more,” Kent can feel himself twitch.

And it was never like this. Never this soft and languid and endless, even when he imagined himself a future where this sort of touch could be real. Where there would be someone solid—real flesh and bone and teeth and nails—who would call his name full of an emotion that was much more than just lust.

Kent enters Bitty and fuck if it isn’t the most grounded he’s felt in years. The one time he felt full and alive in his own body. He has no urge to abuse it—to push his muscles till they rip or draw blood until he can shed his skin. He presses forward and the heat and tightness of Bitty around him make him want to breathe. To suck in all the oxygen around them and light on fire.

“Fuck, Bitty,” Kent groans. “You’re—fuck, you’re amazing.”

“Kenny, yes. _Move.”_

Kent feels alive. So much more because he had never realized that part of him had died that night many years ago. Because Bitty is light and sound and laughter on long roads and someone he can imagine living for. Living with. Spending long mornings tasting brews and adding powdered sugar to peaches. Skipping practice and driving miles to find the perfect frozen pond on off days in January to skate themselves—just the two of them. The snow falling down and making white freckles on Bitty’s nose. Curling up together to watch bad movies and memorizing every line to quote back at each other over dinner.

It feels selfish and almost wrong. _Almost_. Except that then, Bitty grasps Kent’s hips and presses his fingers in and says, “Kenny—I love you. Please, keep—I love you.”

Kent’s heart seizes and grows and he doesn’t deserve it. He can’t have done anything to deserve it. Before he knows, he’s kissing Bitty’s shoulder and mumbling words he can hardly keep track of.

He pulls them both up so Bitty can straddle him, keeping his own time with his flexible legs while Kent is free to lick Bitty’s chest and neck and jaw. Kiss his chin and nose and lips. Kiss him.

Just, kiss him.

Bitty’s hips twist and snap and press into him. There’s something growing in Kent’s stomach—coursing through his core to his chest and eyes. It’s in his bones and he’s saying, “Don’t stop. Don’t stop.” And he’s close to bursting.

Kent wraps a hand around Bitty’s dick and works him until he comes, shuttering into Kent’s hand. He follows soon after, with Bitty’s hands pressed over his biceps and his tongue in his mouth.

They fall into the sheets again and Kent curls into Bitty’s side, willing himself not to fall apart.

“Kent?” Bitty says. “Kenny? What’s wrong?”

“N—nothing,” Kent manages because it should be true. Bitty is the break of daylight on the horizon and it’s too bright for Kent’s midnight eyes. There’s something so hungry in Kent he never wanted to look at. He ignored it for so long, telling himself there were only certain things he was worthy of. He was already so lucky to be what he was—famous and playing and _living._ But it never felt like this with Jack and now he has to look at that hole in his chest he’s been covering up. He chokes.

“Kent, was it something I did? I thought—I’m so sorry, what did I—?”

Kent sobs, tears falling fast and hot and he grips Bitty’s side so he has something to hold onto. He wants so badly to tell Bitty it isn’t him; it will never be him. He gasps and shakes and can’t get the words out, so he just hugs Bitty tighter.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Bitty says. He puts his arm around Kent’s head, cuddling him close. “Kenny, I’m not leaving.”

So, Kent lets himself break.

He cries for all the broken promises he’s leaving at Jack’s feet. He cries for the love that wasn’t enough and all that he couldn’t do for him. And, what Jack could never do for Kent. Because now Kent knows for sure that he’ll never be able to satisfy them both, no matter how many years he gives what he thought was his whole heart in the pursuit. He hasn’t been happy. He didn’t know what it felt like, and now, he’ll never be able to go back. He didn’t think it could feel like this.

He cries for every goodbye. Every death and death wish.

It feels like letting go.

 

Kent wakes to the sun bleeding through the bedroom curtains over a mess of blonde hair, the steady rhythm of Bitty’s breathing against his side, and the lingering smell of sex. It’s a Tuesday, one without a game or a practice or even a PT session, so he’s free to sleep in and rest his bones.

Bitty stirs and Kent kisses his forehead. They’re both halfway between dreams and wake, so when Bitty mumbles, “Mornin’,” Kent just tangles their legs together and closes his eyes again.

They lay like that for a while.

 

When Kent finally staggers out of bed—his need for a glass of water and a shower finally winning out—he leaves Bitty behind to keep snoozing and walks out into the hall and to the kitchen. He stops before he reaches it.

There, sitting on the sofa as if he were waiting all night for Kent to find him, is Jack. Jack—half there and half not—looking more like a ghost than Kent ever remembered.

Jack doesn’t say a thing and neither does Kent. Not for some time. Not until Bitty wanders out to see where Kent went and sees the two of them, staring.

“I thought—” Kent says. He doesn’t know what he thought. He doesn’t know magic. “I just felt like he’d—”

“Be gone?” Bitty says. “Hun, that’s not how it works.”

“I thought, since we—”

“Kent. As flattering as that is, it isn’t about me,” Bitty says. “There are so many ties between you and Jack, things that you have to let go of.”

But it is Kent’s entire life. Every one of Kent’s steps for years. He doesn’t know how to untie their whole histories. “I can’t. Not all of it.”

“No, I don’t s’pose you can,” Bitty says. “He’ll always be a part of you, but you can let go just enough to set him free. I know you can.”

It still feels like too much. Like an impossible task and he can’t see his way forward. It must show on his face because Bitty wraps one arm around middle and holds him tight against his side.

“You know you’re not alone, right?” Bitty says.

Kent nods. Tries his best to feel Bitty’s hands instead of the guilt. “Did you mean what you said last night?” he asks.

Bitty bites his lip and takes his time to answer. “Anything I said last night—yes. Yes, I did.”

Kent kisses Bitty. “I love you, too.”

 

* * *

 

Bitty watches the strings between Kent and Jack break, one by one. Sometimes, they thread back together, because Kent can’t help but want to please. Because Kent sees something on TV that makes him laugh and turn to Jack to see if he could see it too. Because Kent has old muscle memory on the ice that goes beyond what he can control.

“Sometimes, I think about who Jack could have become,” Kent tells him when they’re making dinner together on Bitty’s last night in Vegas. “He would have grown. Would have been someone different, I think.”

Bitty stirs chopped tomatoes into the pan. “He would have wanted different things.”

At the corner of Bitty’s vision, he can see the threads snap. One, two, three.

“He would have wanted different things,” Kent repeats.

 

Bitty calls Alicia Zimmermann.

“Eric?” she says when she picks up.

“He’ll be gone soon,” Bitty says. “I promised I’d let you know.”

Alicia is quiet for some time. It’s only the crackling static of her breathing that lets Bitty know that the call isn’t dropped.

“This is good, right?” Alicia says, finally. She’s asking like she wants so badly to convince herself.

“There’s still time for you to visit him,” Bitty says. “During a game, or maybe I could see if I could communicate what he says—” The truth is, at this point, Bitty doesn’t know if that’s even possible anymore. Jack has been fading fast and he’s hardly heard a word from him in the last couple weeks.

“I’m not sure.”

“What about Mister Zimmermann?” Bitty asks.

“Bob won’t want to hear about it,” Alicia says. “He’s not a bad man. You have to understand, we all had to deal with this in different ways. Bob—he convinced himself that he moved on years ago.”

“You can come alone.”

“No,” Alicia says. Slowly, her voice low and round. “No. I think—I don’t know who that would help. Not me. I want so badly to have my son back, but if I think if I thought I could have him in any way—no.”

Bitty chews his lip. “Did you get that package?”

He’d packed up memories—all the bits and pieces he’d gathered from Jack’s room and the interviews and Jack’s own voice. For once, it wasn’t magic wrapped up in food. He’d found an old spell of his grandmother’s that imbued the calm of a single moment into a piece of jewelry. He used the thread from a stuffed bear and the lace of Jack’s first skate and made a bracelet so fine and thin, but unbreakable.

A single moment for Alicia Zimmermann to bask in whenever she needed to—her, Bob, and Jack encased in thread forever. It was a quiet moment Kent had witnessed when they didn’t know he was watching. Kent had gifted that memory for Bitty to use as the anchor of the magic.

“I did,” she says. “I don’t know how you—it doesn’t matter. Thank you.”

“It was nothing.”

“It wasn’t and you know it,” she says. “Tell Kent—tell him I’m going to call him soon. That I owe him many things a mother should never owe a child.”

“He’ll understand.”

Alicia sighs. “I don’t know if that says more about me or him that I know he will.”

 

* * *

 

“Do you know where you’re going?” Jeff asks Kent. It’s April, the start of the playoffs. They’re against Minnesota and they’ve been on the road for a while and he’s tired.

“We’ve gotta focus on this first,” Kent says.

“Shit, man. I know you’re not going to throw a playoff run by planning ahead,” Jeff says. “You’re too fucking competitive for that.”

Kent laughs. “I was worried about you, old man.”

“Just wait till you’re on the other side of that circle. Don’t forget I know all your dirty tricks.”

“You wouldn’t fight me,” Kent says. “My face is just too pretty.”

“You’re right,” Jeff says. “I’d sick Freddy on you.”

Kent feigns betrayal, shaking his head and stepping back. Really, he isn’t sure what he’s going to do with Jeff. If Jack made him a hockey player, Jeff was the one who made him a professional.

He’s relearning both.

“Bruins, Falconers, or Islanders,” Kent says.

“Press got it a bit wrong, then.”

“Press thinks I just care about money.”

“Well then,” Jeff says. “Time to give them a show. Let them know what you’re worth.”

 

* * *

 

Game one is a loss for Vegas, but just barely.

Game two goes smoother and by the third period, the Aces are up 3-0.

“What are you making?” Lardo says, peeking into the living room from the kitchen.

“Just drying out an energy brew,” Bitty says.

“Sure,” Lardo says. “But it’s supposed to be… steaming like that, right? Because last game you tried to brew and watch—”

“Yes, Lardo, it’s supposed to do that,” Bitty says. He doesn’t want to talk about the incident with the brownies. Yes, he’d put too much giddiness in it and _yes,_ he left them it too long, but he didn’t like those curtains anyway. Kent’s on the ice again and he grips the arm of the couch.

“You have a timer on it?”

“Goodness, yes, yes,” he says. He doesn’t. Kent sweeps around the back of the net and hits a one-timer that bounces off the goalie’s stick. “Just come and watch with me.”

Lardo takes one last wary look at the kitchen before launching herself over the back of the couch to take her place next to Bitty.

The Aces win 4-0.

 

* * *

 

When Kent gets back to Vegas for game three, a package is waiting for him. Inside is a single glass jar with Bitty’s handwriting on the paper label.

_A wish of my own when I can’t wake up next to you. Mix with protein powder and think of strawberries and the song of a robin._

 

Jack appears for only a moment at the edge of the rink the next day. For a moment he’s at the boards, watching Kent warm up. Kent’s tense, he knows it. Home ice and the pressure’s on. He pours water into his mouth to distract himself from the noise. 

“Playoffs?” Jack says. Kent has to lean in to hear him.

“You’d think it’d get easier,” Kent replies under his breath.

Jack taps his head against Kent’s helmet. “You’re the best player I know,” he says before he loses his color once again and goes silent.

* * *

 

The Aces advance with a win in game six, but their playoff run ends when St. Louis outplays them in the next round. It’s hard for Kent, Bitty knows it is. It’s hard for him to lose and it’s hard for him to lose on such a big stage. It’s also hard, he understands now, to start to leave all of Vegas behind. No matter what he says, that city is in him now. The desert clings to him like magic does—Bitty smells it on him the next time he comes to Samwell to visit.

“I’m meeting with the Bruins GM tomorrow,” Kent says.

His fingers stumble as they learn to roll dough for puff pastry. He doesn’t become frustrated though when the butter clumps or melts. He tries again. Kent looks up to Bitty with a dusting of flour over his hands and asks to do it again. _I want to learn._

Bitty goes to the fridge and grabs another disc of butter they’d prepped before. “Again?”

“I think—” Kent says, wipes his hands on a cloth and measures out the dough again, mouth forming a focused line. “I need to make a decision soon and there’s a lot to discuss.”

There’s a tan along the line of Kent’s watch. Bitty can see it when he shapes the dough. Another sign of the desert—the heat he’ll be leaving. He wonders if Kent will want to bottle it in some way, those years in Vegas etched into his skin. Encase it in glass to look back at and know that he survived it.

“Fuck,” Kent says as he tries to roll again.

“It’s fine,” Bitty says. “We can fix it still, see?”

Bitty wraps his hands around Kent’s, trying to loosen the pressure he’s putting on the rolling pin. He’s trying so hard he’s making it too thin, so it’ll break when they put the butter in. Kent’s hands relax under Bitty’s. They fold and the pastry starts to take shape.

When Bitty steps back, Kent’s shoulders sag and he braces his hands on the counter.

“I’m forgetting him,” Kent says. Bitty knows. He can hardly see Jack’s form now and the strings are faint and wavering—just smudges and shadows that suggest a face or a line of a body. Bitty can also see how hard Kent is trying not to pull him back.

“It isn’t forgetting.”

“He hasn’t spoken to me for weeks,” Kent says. “Or skated with me or—it’s not fair, is it? For me to get to move on?”

“Hun, fairness is never the way to think about it.”

When Kent doesn’t respond, Bitty takes the pastry in clear wrap and puts it in the fridge. He does a cursory sweep of the counter with a cloth and takes his apron off.

“Come with me,” Bitty says.

“What?”

“Sweetie, just listen to me.” Bitty smirks. “And bring your skates.” 

 

It’s just after finals and graduation is just around the corner, so Lardo is happy to exercise the last of her powers as manager to let Bitty and Kent into Faber. Bitty is convinced she’s copied every key she’s ever gotten a hold of anyway. He should probably ask about that.

The rink is empty and quiet. The kind of quiet that makes every edge of a blade echo against the walls. It makes Bitty feel infinite, his skating large and a creature of its own. He grabs Kent’s arm and trots down to the benches to lace up.

“Figure skates?” Kent says.

“And I’ll still beat you in a race,” Bitty says, slipping them on.

“I won the all-star fastest skater competition twice.”

“Bless you,” Bitty says. “Y’all think that hockey players are the best skaters out there.”

“I think I could—” Kent says, but Bitty’s already on the ice.

“Catch me, then!”

Bitty heads around to the far corner, reacquainting himself with his edges and picks. He’s not out on figure skates as often as he’d like and each time, it’s a little like coming home. When he hears Kent’s blades hit the ice behind him, Bitty turns and jumps, extending his leg in landing and searching for Kent’s reaction.

“Show off!” he shouts from down the ice.

“Alright, Mr. I-won-the-all-star.”

Kent skates toward him, low and fast, his cowlick flattened back by the air rushing by. Bitty doesn’t give him a chance to reach him. He’s off as well, rushing along the boards so he’s far enough that even if Kent tries to turn, he doesn’t have enough space to cut him off.

Bitty gets past him.

“What about a spin?” Kent calls back to him, taking the far turn. “Those are always my favorite.”

“Always?”

“I follow figure skating,” Kent says. “Sometimes.”

Bitty obliges. He does a simple sit spin combination and it feels good. Balanced.

When he stops, he can see Kent skating up to him—fast, arms out.

And Bitty still has a fear of checking. He’s gotten better, Ransom and Holster helping him out throughout the years, but it’s still there. Still real. But, here with just him and Kent, he’s not afraid at all. He has a veteran NHL player coming full speed at him, but his mind tells him, _partner._ He’s in figure skates, he’s performing, and this man is here to skate with him.

Bitty opens his arms and Kent wraps himself up in them.

“That’s really fucking hot, you know that?”

“Competence?”

Kent laughs. It fills the rink just as much as the sound of hundreds of cheering fans can. Even more. He lets him go.

“Can you do that—” Kent lifts his leg and turns his head up. He looks a little like a broken doll. “That spin?”

“Biellmann?” Bitty says. “Hun, I’m glad you think I’m that flexible, but absolutely not.”

“I think you’re very flexible,” Kent says. “That thing you did last night with the—”

“Oh, shush!”

Kent’s lips curl up and he raises an eyebrow.

Bitty sticks his tongue out and skates away. “Catch me and maybe I’ll teach you how to do your own spin.”

Kent’s after him. “Won’t look as good as you.”

“Course not,” Bitty says. “But I think you will look pretty with your ass on the ice.”

He hears an undignified noise behind him and the sound of Kent’s skates picking up the pace.

 

Two hours later, sweat rings both their collars and ice shavings color their legs white. Kent is leaning against the boards with a lazy smile.

“When was the last time you skated for fun?” Bitty asks.

Kent thinks. “There was that family skate—no, maybe that Hockey is for Everyone event…?”

“For _you,_ sweetie. Fun for you.”

Kent shrugs. Bitty watches a thread connected to Kent’s heart snap. “I haven’t been skating for myself for a while.”

He pushes himself off of the wall and glides to center ice.

“I love this sport,” Kent says, like it’s a confession. “I think more than it deserves. But that doesn’t change it.”

Two more threads snap. The connection is weak; they both know it.

“I’m telling the Bruins I’m committing,” Kent says. “We have to sign paperwork and it won’t be official until July, but—this is what I want.”

“I’m proud of you, Kenny,” Bitty says.

Kent sighs and it sounds like an ocean tide coming in. He closes his eyes, breathes through his nose, and the world feels like a single spool of thread unwinding.

Bitty listens to the sound of a pair of skates, neither his nor Kent’s, skating away. It’s both present and many, many years old. It’s here, and then, it’s just an echo.

 

* * *

 

The first game of the Bruins 2016-2017 season, Kent Parson skates onto the ice. The talk that day is about his new number, an unconventional choice they all say. Some people remember the drama surrounding the 2009 draft, but only a few get the connection. A handful knew Jack Zimmermann’s number in the Q.

Kent Parson wears a #1 on his jersey as he scores the first goal for his new team. He does it not for the ghost he’d carried for years, but for the friend he once had.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm dieoftahtroar on tumblr if you want to want to chat about magical pies or my new fascination in IRL hockey.


End file.
